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SHADOW LAND; 



OR, 



THE SEER. 



BY ^ 

MRS. E. OAKES SMITH, 

AUTHOR OF SINLESS CHILD, LOST ANGEL, THE WESTERN CAPTIVE, 
WOMAN AND HER NEEDS, ETC., ETC. 



; Now since every opposite comes near to its correlative in one or more points of con- 
tact, which, as they establish, also serve to maintain the relationship between the 
two, so the state of the soul in dreaming will serve strikingly to illustrate its 
waking action." Schlegel's Philosophy of Life. 



NEW YORK: 
PUBLISHED BY FOWLERS AND WELLS, 

CLINTON HALL, 131 NASSAU STREET. 



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Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1351, 

BY MRS. E. OAKES SMITH, 

In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the Southern District of New York, 



0-. 

A* 

EDWARD 0. JENKINS, 

Printer and Stereotyper, C , . 

No. 114 Nassau Street. 



TO 

ts. C. 31., (Saritnu, 

THE FRIEND OF MY GIRLHOOD, 

THE BELOVED COMPANION OF MY SCHOOL-DATS, 

THIS LITTLE VOLUME 

IS 
AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED 

BY THE AUTHOR. 



|5nfar*. 



In presenting tlie following pages to the public, 
the Author feels some delicacy on account of the 
apparently autobiographic aspect it may be supposed 
to wear; but she begs the reader to bear in mind, 
that she has not presumed to present her waking 
experience to their observation — like a child with a 
magic lantern, she has only thrown shadows upon 
the surface, keeping the substance still in the back 
ground. 

She has been willing to cast what little light she 
is able upon psychological grounds, in the hope that 
others will do the same, and thus relieve the subject 
from much of its obscurity. 

Brooklyn, L. I., 

October, 22nd, 1851. 



Cfltihttts, 



CHAPTER I. 
The dreamless Sleeper — Poetry is Truth, of the highest Kind — Dreams needless 
to the Laborer — The true Sphere — Marriage Vows — Process of Sleep, . . 9 



CHAPTER II. 
Kitchen Dreams — Influence of Inferior Ghosts upon Dreams — The Rapping 
Spirits — Confessions, 16 



CHAPTER III. 

Confessions continued — Soul State prefigured — Prophetic Dreams— The Body of 
the Resurrection— The Grief Child. 30 



CHAPTER IV. 

Byron — Congested Brain — Gunshot Wound — Socrates — Wisdom is Music — Mil- 
ton's Sonnet Prayer — A Decision, 33 

CHAPTER V. 
A Beautiful Vision — Face Expression — Daniel Webster — Oliver Cromwell — The 
Unfulfilled Mission — The Dream Foe, 45 

CHAPTER VI. 
EdgarA.Poe — Presaging Eyes — Swooning — A Dream, 51 

CHAPTER VII. 

The Unfortunate always Superstitious— Saul of Israel— He seeks the stray Asses, 
and finds a Kingship— The Witch of Endor 60 



V1U CONTENTS. 

CHAPTER VIII. 
Astrology — A Horoscope — Nostrodamus — Predictions, ...... 69 

CHAPTER IX. 
Shakspeare's belief in Astrology — Madam De Stael — The Prescience of the Poet, 80 

CHAPTER X. 
Astrology — The two Horoscopes — The Unfortunate grow Superstitious— Pleas- 
ant Fancies — Irish Superstition — Good Old Mary, 88 

CHAPTER XL 
Contempt cast upon the Imagination — Latent Truths unfolding — Double Dream- 
ing—Ghosts, . 99 

CHAPTER XII. 
A Presentiment— Traditional Authority — Impalpable Shapes — The One Sin — 
The Penitent Child Spirit, • .... 110 

CHAPTER XIII. 
The Ominous Thirteen— Home Superstitions— The Ghost Father— The Step- 
Mother, 120 



SHADOW LAID. 



fjjapifr fust 

Behold this dreamer cometh. — Bible. 
Which gives me hope 
That what in sleep thou didst abhor to dream, 
Waking thou never wilt consent to do. — Milton. 

The dreamless sleeper — Poetry is truth of the highest kind — Dreams needless to the 
laborer — The true sphere — Marriage Vows — Process of Sleep. 

We were telling a dream, and looked into the face 
of our listener with that obstinate kind of idiosyncrasy 
that belongs to dreamers, but which it would be diffi- 
cult to explain — we, an obstinate psychologist, believ- 
ing in all spiritualisms, because the good Father has 
made this part of our nature so urgent and unmistaka- 
ble, that it is more difficult to doubt the realities of 
the internal than the external life. We looked into 
his face — 

" I never dream, madam." 

11 Never dream! Then I am afraid you have no 
soul." 

" No soul ! Madam, do you believe in the Bible? 
or are you only talking poetry ?" 

"Only talking poetry? — only! I am talking of 
facts — of the most undeniable testimony to soul-exist- 
l* 



10 ANXIOUS QUESTIONINGS. 

ence which, dreaming affords. Suppose it is poetry. 
Is not poetry truth ? — the deep, solemn truth, felt at 
the bottom of every soul ? — truth that will lift up its 
voice and cry aloud in every human heart till the 
world stifles its utterance ?" 

" Oh dear, madam, I do not comprehend a word 
you say ; and yet I dare be bound it is very good." 

No more did he. How could he, who never 
dreamed, understand poetry ? And what right had I 
to attempt indoctrinating him with the spirit of poetry, 
and disturbing his smooth dullness and excellent 
digestion with a malicious and energetic speech out 
of the common track ? 

Hence comes our book of Shadow Land : and 
hence, from encountering many, and often in the 
world, those who never dream, has arisen in my mind 
many an anxious questioning as to the hereafter of 
those who are denied this testimony of spirit to spirit. 
Now, in sleep, I imagine, there is a brief period which 
the perturbations of sense, and the jaded faculties of 
the brain, require for the subsidence of their activity. 
Grently and tenderly the sleep spirit enfolds a veil 
over each, and applies a " sweet oblivious antidote" 
to the " thick coming fancies" of the o'er-tasked head 
or heart. 

The sturdy laborer sinks into dreamless repose. 
"With him " 'tis a good dullness," and he is attended 
by a very lob of a spirit, 

" Stretched out all the chimney's length." 

The " lubber fiend," who regales his ears with the 



HAIL FELLOWS. 11 

sound of his " shadowy flail," heard faintly in the night 
watches, "but we are spirits of another kind," to 
whom the mystic hours of sleep are the hours in which 
the spirit claims the supremacy, and with a companion- 
able confidence, more than half turns the bright side 
of the lantern of eternal life to our view, affording 
gleams of light, and beauty, and power, otherwise hid- 
den from the soul. 

After the senses have been cottoned into quiet, and 
the needful checks applied to the brain locomotive, 
we are ourselves — we are in our own true sphere, and 
that sphere has its juxtaposition with others akin to 
itself. Spiritual essences y high or low, good or bad, 
instantly recognize their fellow, and hence arise the 
different experiences of dreams. When we awake we 
bring back to the world the impressions of our nightly 
companionships in spirit-land — we bear with us our 
own sphere, with its good or evil hail fellows ; and we 
can no more escape these than we can lay aside our 
own identity. We ought to know, by our sleep 
observation, exactly what spirit we are of — whether 
our souls have any size or not to them — whether they 
are out and out large, active, beautiful and harmoni- 
ous, or only the very babies of soul land, mere dwarfs 
in the spiritual; embryotic, undeveloped punies, hardly 
worth a resurrection ; poor, meagre weaklings, un- 
escaped from bib and tucker, with great thick lips and 
blubber cheeks, and piggish eyes, and dumpy legs, 
the very toads of the spirit. We ought to know if 
this be the case with us, because the inference is 
strongly confirmative, if we have no dreams. We 
ought to know, too, by the nature of these, whether 



12 ASTEOLOGIC BELIEF. 

we are in the chaotic transition state of human de- 
velopment, or are evolving ourselves beautifully, and 
in harmony with permanent good. We ought to 
know whether our sphere centres in heaven or hell, 
for we are in one or the other, and it is well to know 
which it is. 

The old astrologers believed that evil spirits had 
great power in sleep, and a passionate fondness for 
beautiful women, whom they caressed sleeping: and 
filled their fancies with voluptuous images, to which 
belief Milton probably referred, when he represents 
Satan breathing into the ear of Eve luxurious melody, 
and unholy desires, for the forbidden tree — he, " squat 
like a toad," and fanning her brow with the breath of 
the infernals. The suggestion is a startling one, and 
accords with the injunction — " keep the heart with 
all diligence, for out of it are the issues of life." The 
welling fountain may send forth streams to mingle 
with high and holy essences, or streams that shall com- 
mingle with those from less consecrated regions. 

Did the pre-Adamite men and women sleep ? Did 
they dream ? I think not. Or no otherwise than 
the horse or the dog dreams, they being more ele- 
mentary men and women, distinguished by sex merely. 
To dream well, one must be alone : there is a neu- 
tralizing of the divine essence where another head 
is busied with its angel on the same pillow. Hence, 
the all-importance that the husband and wife should 
be entirely congenial: for if they do not move in 
the same sphere, that of each will be either neutra- 
lized, or so jumbled up and confused, as to bar the 
joyous action of the true spirit. A kind of ward- 



MAKRIAGE STATE DREAMING. 13 

ership is established by which neither enters freely 
its own domain, but is met at the gate by a sort 
of sleep sentry, who demands why these two, who 
venture to lay their heads upon the same pillow, are 
wandering so far apart in shadow land, and they are 
each ashamed and fearful to go out ; and so they return 
to the body and either dream not at all, or dream of 
what they have been about all day, and fret over 
what has before fretted them too much, and revive 
useless conferences and every day images, quite to the 
detriment and starvation of the soul. 

It will be seen ho\v all-important, in dream-land, 
are harmonious relations in life. When this is not the 
case, the husband or wife, whichever may be pure 
minded or en lowed best with the gifts of the spiritual, 
will find him or her bewildered, and hindered, and 
obstructed in dream-out-going by the material sphere 
of his or her companion, which is, in effect, a icatt 
of imprisonment. Where gross evils, uncharitableness, 
envy in gs, strifes, hypocrisies, exist, legions of black- 
ness block the way of egress, and fill the unhappy 
night companion with terrors. 

Adam, alone in Paradise, slept, and Eve was his 
dream. Milton says that Eve slept, and the serpent 
was hers , "squat like a toad" close to her ear. Alas! 
for the sad change from the solitary dreamer of Eden, 
when Eve was conceived, and the wild waste of earth, 
with its wearisome companionships, and the tree of 
knowledge guarded with the serpent stings of unsat- 
isfied yearnings ! 

The spirit needs no sleep ; what death is to the 
body, sleep would be to the soul. It finds its Sabbath, 



14 SOUL OUT GOINGS. 

which, is rest, when it reposes upon some great and 
beautiful thought ; when it has reached some compan- 
ionship nearest its higher elements ; when it finds 
itself in some atmosphere akin to its nature, and it 
breathes and glows in loveliness like the blossom of 
the field, too ineffably content even to need a voice. 
We may imagine the spiritual being laying down its 
material companion tenderly to slumber, withdrawing 
itself gently from the exhausted receptacle, and rejoic- 
ing in its freedom from the frettings of daily life ; while 
itself, needless of repose, goes out into new and un- 
tried spheres, filling its urn at divine fountains, light- 
ing the torch of its existence in the glories of the Infi- 
nite Source ; holding its companionship with undying 
affinities, and enlarging itself by ranging through 
illimitable space. 

Once, during a period of suffering, I must have re- 
mained soul-conscious from the moment of sleeping. . 
I was then, as I often am, aware of fhe process of 
sleep, its coming on, and the fading away of conscious- 
ness. Ideas commingled, and I felt a sensation of 
pain in the region of the heart ; a sense of dread, as 
it were, pervading the nerves, as if they shrank from 
a power which they could not resist. I think this 
state is not unlike death. It is always so distinctly 
defined, I am almost lost ; then rouse myself, as if in 
opposition to some state which appals me, and then 
am gone. Death's twin brother has the ascendant. 
At the time of which I am speaking, I thought I 
raised my body up gently, and laid it in a grave that 
seemed ready for it ; I smoothed the turf down or- 



A DREAM. 15 

derly with a vague feeling that blossoms would grow 
therefrom, and then stood, the only mourner over my 
poor self, weeping bitterly. The impression was so 
vivid that I awoke before my soul could start upon 
its journey. 

A DREAM. 

I dreamed last night, that I myself did lay- 
Within the grave, and after stood and wept : 
My spirit sorrowed where its ashes slept ! 
Twas a strange dream, and yet methinks it may 
Prefigure that which is akin to truth. 
How sorrow we o'er perished dreams of youth, 
High hopes and aspirations doomed to be 
Crushed and o'ermastered by earth's destiny ! 
Fame, that the spirit loathing turns to ruth; — 
And that deluding faith so loath to part, 
That earth will shrine for us one kindred heart ! 
Oh, 'tis the ashes of such things that wring 
Tears from the eyes — hopes like to these depart, 
And we bow down in dread o'ershadowed by death's wing! 



CJraptn $*nmft. 

"The things that day most minds, by night do most appear." — Spenser. 

I really am ashamed of the poverty of my dreams. — Charles Lamb. 

Nay oft in dream's invention we bestow- 
To change a flounce or add a furbelow. — Pope. 

Ah me, for pity ! what a dream was here. — ShakspeAre. 

Kitchen dreams— Influence of Inferior Ghosts upon Dreams— The Rapping Spirits-— 

Confessic 

Perhaps the majority of people in the world make 
such a medley of life, that they are mere fragments of 
humanities, the disjecta membra of men and women, 
never brought into any one, harmonious order of ex- 
istence. We do not know where to find them when 
awake, and in sleep they are mere ignus fatui. It 
may be suspected that they will need be sent 'back to 
this world or some other, in some shape or other, till 
they may become consolidated into entire creations. 
They are oppressed with vagaries and weak or wicked 
conceits, and we look wonderingly upon them, unable 
to receive their flimsy, shallow manifestations into 
favor as representatives of any aspect of our race. 
We suspect they must have been born before their time, 
and never freed entirely from the pre-existent fishy, or 
amphibious preparatory state. 



m LIMBO. 17 

These dream only of subordinate, or intermediate 
objects. Their spirits, in sleejD, infest marshes and 
pools, and see misty lakes, and huge serpents, fleas, 
and toads, and reptiles in all shapes ; they never rise 
into the blue empyrean ; never behold the mountain 
way and the denizens of the wilderness, nor the 
shadowy veils of supernal inhabitants. 

They are imps of the kitchen, or drawing-room at 
most ; and, if any spirit answers to their sphere, it 
must be those of unclaimed and disaffected ghosts, 
who, having no substance within themselves, out of 
which to compound a spiritual body, wander about 
church-yards, or haunt the localities where they enacted 
old crimes, or lived frivolous and disjointed lives. It is 
probable spirits of this kind infested the house of the 
elder Wesley, rattling the kettles of the cook, and 
knocking mysteriously in various parts of the domain. 
It may be that these uneasy spirits hoped to find 
relief from the better atmosphere they perceived about 
the dwelling ; might have hoped to be " clothed upon," 
in their weak state, formless and naked, and thus be 
admitted into some sphere. 

It may be that the spirits called the Eappers, if 
such exist, and I am unwilling to treat human testi- 
mony with such contempt as to reject them altogether, 
belong to this class. They are in, what Dante would 
call Limbo, driven to and fro, perturbed and lonely, 
These eagerly question the finer spirits, who pass 
through their realm on their way to higher spheres, 
of all the gossip that used to interest them on earth. 
But, inasmuch as the companionship of these people 
was in no way desirable while they lived in this world, 



18 GOSSIPS OF GHOST LAND. 

they become less so when separated from the body. 
They are the gossips of ghost land, poor, frivolous, 
flimsy wretches, who receive the shreds of thought 
here, and the shadows only of thought in the spirit 
world, for all thought has a body and a substance as 
it were to itself, so that we say a thought may be 
grasped in anticipation of the fact hereafter ; hence, 
thought finding no opportunity for lodgment in 
these thin poor spirits, floats right through them. 
They have a restless desire for tangibility, and are 
perpetually trying to command material objects in a 
way to make themselves known. 

We find in this world a class who do not dream, 
and yet who should not be regarded with distrust, 
notwithstanding the failure. They are persons of 
good health, and active habits, and well-balanced 
bodies, to whom existence by itself is a blessing. 
They realize the night comfort, denied to the miserable 
Macbeth when he exclaimed, "the Innocent sleep." 
They yield themselves joyously to the drowsy god, 
resigning to temporary oblivion their well cared for 
earthly tabernacles with an unctuous content, at once 
confiding and refreshing. These never remember 
their dreams, though dreaming all the time, for they 

" Do G-od's will and know it not.'' 

They awake with a new life, conscious only of wan- 
dering through interminable scenes of grace and 
beauty, ravished by sweet sounds, and fanned by 
breezes softer than those of Araby. 

I belong to neither of these. As a child I used to 



CHILD EXPERIENCE. 19 

lay my head upon my pillow with an earnest expec- 
tancy. The sleep world was a vast, a peopled, and 
beautiful realm, into which I entered as an inmate. I 
used to wonder that other children would devour 
cakes and pies after having experienced the pains of 
illness, or the horrors of bad dreams from that cause. 
I, with the most dainty perceptions, never felt even 
tempted to repeat such an experience. Sleep gave me 
a sensation of terror, when unattended by dreams, 
even in early life. For to me it was full of images, 
often too vast for my infantile soul. Huge mountains, 
piled in solitary grandeur, towered forever around 
me, and shadows, floating like dense banners, were 
flecked with light, and gave place to rainbows, and 
stars and moons. I do not remember to have dreamed 
of the sun. I seemed myself in light always, without 
knowing the source from which it came. 

I can recall now vividly the awe with which I used 
to pray before sinking into that state, and how I used 
to wonder if it was right to pray the good Father for 
pleasant dreams. Indeed, I was often puzzled to 
know how to call this sleeping experience, grotesque 
and disjointed, I found it to be in my companions, but 
with me consistent, solemn, and earnest. I used to 
wonder " if -I did not go heaven" in my sleep, and yet 
never dared to ask the opinion of my friends, lest 
they should think me ill, or desirous to appear what 
I was not, for I was sensitively alive to a shadow of 
pretension on my own part, holding back the best im- 
pulses of my being, lest untruth or the love of ap- 
proval should have a part in them. 



20 TERROR IN DARKNESS. 

I used to dream of joyous shapes floating in the air, 
which were angels to me. I must have started very 
early in life the heresy, that angels have no wings, 
because these creatures had none in my sleep. These 
did not speak to me, but looked lovingly upon me, 
and I would clasp my hands with such fervency of 
desire to be worthy of their companionship, that I 
often awoke in tears. I grew shy when others talked 
of dreams, lest I should be balled upon to describe my 
world of visions, which then I felt would be a dese- 
cration. I am confident one reason why children dread 
being alone in the dark, is owing to the huge shapes, 
and vague impressions of unfamiliar scenes brought 
to the mind in the process of dreaming. It is cruel to 
compel them to darkness where this is the case. I 
have no doubt many a child might trace the morbid 
action of his faculties to an undue severity upon this 
ground. " Truly the light is good, and a pleasant 
thing it is to behold the sun." 

For myself I needed no indulgence on this score. 
I was a courageous child, delighting in the mystical, 
and confidently expecting some revelation, longing for 
a mission such as came to the child Samuel — bending 
my ear to listen, and ready to say, " speak Lord." 1 
often heard my own name called, both by day and night, — 
and found upon inquiry, that no one had spoken to 
me. I learned to clasp my hands, waiting and long- 
ing for the revelation, which should follow the invo- 
cation. As life wore on, and the actual presence 
was withheld, I redoubled my little fasts, and was 
more earnest in my prayers that I might be ac- 



CHAPTER SECOND. 21 

counted worthy, I inflicted childish, penances upon 
myself, all to no purpose. Dreams of rare, signifi- 
cancy I had indeed, and day-dreams of grandeur and 
beauty too deep for any utterance — poetry in its mani- 
fold forms came to my mind's eye, but unearthly shapes, 
to these strange voices were not vouchsafed. 

I used to dream of being poised in space, surrounded 
with a gray atmosphere, which gave back neither 
object nor voice. I felt a weird pleasure in this 
pulseless kind of being ; so aimless, silent, but yet full 
of unearthly rest, for I was a sensitive child, so acute 
in my perceptions that thoughts were so many pains, 
and joy and grief had a magnitude disproportioned to 
my years. They err, who say childhood is the hap- 
piest period of life ; I am sure, that to me, with all the 
joyousness of my nature, my sense of suffering was so 
poignant, that even now it pains me to recall the re- 
membrance. Intense happiness as well as intense 
suffering, had no external manifestation with me. I 
was still, and silent, and often have fainted without the 
utterance of a word, while the shades of f££Ling were so 
many showers of smiles or tears ; hence, the comfort 
of this recurring dream of silence and eternal rest, 
with the consciousness of existence, free from all fret- 
tings, and holding every wearied faculty in abeyance. 

As I grew older and my undeveloped reason was 
filled with perpetual questionings, and a conscience 
morbidly alive to the shadows of an evil, became 
oppressed with unchild-like dread, my dreams were 
changed into a more vivid character. I would find 
myself in a world of such glowing beauty and happi- 
ness in my sleep, that I confidently asserted my right 



22 SHADOW LAND. 

to heaven, and my claims to goodness from tlie char- 
acter of my dreams. Bred in the strictest Calvinistic 
school, this self-righteous spirit was severely rebuked, 
but I boldly asserted, that if God condemned me to 
eternal punisment, when I so much desired to be good, 
and when I did nothing I knew to be evil, he would 
be not only unjust but cruel. Here was a polemic of 
six years, roused to antagonism, and suffering all the 
terrors of the law, not one of whose prohibitions I had 
ever dreamed of violating. Falseness in any way 
seemed so unworthy a little lady, that I hardly 
reckoned the most transparent truth as a virtue ; wilful 
indeed was I, but not obstinate, and so courageous in 
my moral sense, that a thousand punishments would 
not have tempted me to the concealment of a wrong. 
A spirit of audacious fun might prompt to mischief, or 
the defence of a weaker child, make me violent, but 
then I prayed so fervently over my misdemeanors, 
over my errors of temper or short comings in duty, 
that I was quite certain that God would not only for- 
give me, but love me — for my childish logic ran in 
this wise — "If everybody that knows me, loves me, 
notwithstanding my many mistakes, surely God, who 
i sees right into my heart and knows how I love good- 
ness, will love me also." 

I was warned in every shape against this self-righte- 
ousness, till my whole little being became chaotic ; for 
I obstinately adhered to the assertion, that "I was a 
good child, and ought to go to heaven, and that if I 
did not go there, it would be an injustice." At this 
time I had a terrific dream ; I reccollect a baby brother 
was sleeping with me, and I hugged him closely, for 



CHAPTER SECOND. 28 

some one had told me that the evil spirits were tempt- 
ing me, and that was the reason I thought so hardly 
of God's laws. I dreamed of being in a " faire countrie," 
with all that was light and joyous about me, when 
suddenly a grave severe personage, looked me in the 
face and said, " this night thy soul shall be required of 
thee." 

Suddenly every little misdemeanor, every unkind 
word, every piece of harmless mischief seemed to rise 
up before me like so many accusing spirits ; indeed 
they were spirits, I thought, actual shapes, that barred 
the way to a golden gate, over the top of which I 
could see a faint gleam of ravishing beauty. I awoke 
in a torrent of tears, and now felt indeed as if shut 
out from heaven. So great was my distress, that it 
cost me a fit of illness, the cause of which I dared tell 
no one, lest they should know how very evil I felt I 
must be in the sight of God. 

After this I was a long time too miserable to dream, 
but I fell into another state, with which dreamers are 
sometimes haunted ; a state either of the mind or bocty, 
by which figures, not altogether human, stand before 
me, or if the state be less perfect, float in the air ; these 
were not a procession of shadows merely, such as 
Locke describes, changing like the colors of a kaleido- 
scope ; but forms perfect in themselves, often station- 
ary for a length of time, and so palpable that I recog- 
nized their recurrence as shadoiuy acquaintances. Some- 
times these images were inconceivably frightful ; enor- 
mous glittering creatures with fiery eyes, and armed 
to the teeth, stood regarding me fixedly, while I looked 
on, with a not unpleased terror. "We had an attend- 



24 A PLOT TO GAIN HEAVEN. 

ant in the family, who was a perfect black letter-book, 
full of traditions of ghosts, and fairies, and men who had 
sold themselves for lucre to the Father of Evil. At 
this time I had not read Milton, but one lofty creature 
that seemed to fill the space of my little room, cold, 
still and erect, I firmly believed to be Satan himself. 
I became accustomed to this shape, and though not 
clearly defined, it impressed me with majesty; while 
an army of impish looking spirits, with distorted eyes 
and lolling tongues, overcame me, not only with terror 
but mortification. I had fallen from the dignity of 
Lucifer and was given over to mean, under-strapping 
devils, I imagined. 

I began to contrive plots for getting into heaven, 
quite in a mean and cowardly manner, of which I sub- 
sequently grew ashamed. I had conceived of a sort 
of Jacob's ladder, up which the spirits of people were 
continually ascending to the golden gate — their long 
white robes floated loosely, and the angels helped 
them from bar to bar — I being a very little one, and 
always expecting to die a child, used to think I could 
/ smuggle myself up under the shadow of these long 
robes, and when I came to the portal, the angels see- 
ing what a poor trembling child I was, who did not 
mean evil, would not have the heart to turn me away. 

I read the miracles of Jesus at this time with great 
care, especially where he casts out evil spirits, and 
came to the solemn conviction that I was given over 
to the powers of darkness to be tempted for a while, 
but was quite sure I should overcome, for I prayed 
day and night for deliverance; and yet I am sure I 
felt a wild delight in these visitations ; a curious child- 



SAVAGE COMFORT. 25 

pleasure in contrasting these hideous images with the 
lovely and graceful ones, that peered in the midst of 
them, and which I believed were my good angels 
helping me in the conflict. I had nearly depaired of 
going to heaven myself, although I felt too proud to 
talk about it, and was ashamed to let anybody know 
what an evil-haunted child I was ; but I redoubled my 
intercessions, for everybody I loved, or did not love, 
and used to imagine them all entering the beautiful 
gate of which I had dreamed, while it was to be shut 
upon me. I was calm in this conviction, thinking if it 
was so to be, it was useless to distress others by letting 
them know my state ; yet with the inconsistency which 
time does not eradicate in any of us, I used to take a 
sort of savage comfort in thinking how badly, my 
friends, who loved me so much, would feel when they 
reached heaven, not to find me there. 

Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress, now gave a coloring 
to my dreams ; I had read the book of the Martyrs, 
and suffered all kinds of daily and nightly tortures on 
its account — had practiced severe penances, run needles 
into my flesh, burnt my fingers, and even drawn a 
blister for the sake of protracted suffering, merely to 
assure myself that I could endure all things with con- 
stancy where I had some great principle at stake. I 
was sorely puzzled to make up my little creed, but 
11 faith in Grod, and in Jesus Christ as the Eedeemer," 
were fixed points. That the death of the latter could 
insure the salvation of men, I thought perfectly natu- 
ral ; still more so, that he should die from love. That 
part of religion impressed me with the most profound 
and beautiful emotions. I could comprehend it I 



26 A SHAKP LOOK-OUT. 

thought, because it seemed natural to die for one that 
we loved ; for I had quietly abandoned the ground, 
that our sins enhanced in the least the magnitude of 
sacrifice: because men were so weak, and knew so 
very little, I thought that God must pity and love them, 
just as I did those who injured me, and were unkind 
to me ignorantly ; or were in that state of mind that 
they couldn't see how I loved, and prayed for every- 
body, especially for those who were evil in their na- 
ture. I was quite sure the more wicked one was, the 
more pitiful Grod must feel, and the more he would 
try to save him. I used to have an indistinct feeling 
that I was greatly loved by the celestials, but that I 
must renounce my consciousness of being good before 
they would assure me to that effect ; but as I could 
not honestly abandon the belief, I was patient in wait 
ing to see what would come of it, and devoted myseli 
with great zeal in the meanwhile to the salvation of 
others. I became quite a supernumerary conscience 
to my playmates ; settling casuistic points in the most 
solemn manner, and keeping a sharp watch upon their 
state, that I might know when my own prayers were 
most needed. 

In my sleep at this time, I was toilsome and op 
pressed. Little children about me told of dreaming 
of dogs, and fruits, and new clothes; and going to 
banquets, and having great triumphs in the shape of 
school-girl erudition and juvenile rivalships. I was 
obliged to keep my dreams to myself, believing them 
to be so much an indication of the real state of the 
soul, that it was better not to grieve my friends by 
letting them into its secrets. They were all vast, 



, THE LOST BABY. 27 

shadowy, supernatural, weighing upon my spirits with 
a mystical kind of awe. When these assumed a pal- 
pable shape, I was relieved and joyous for a while ; 
and yet, child as I was, found myself feeling poor and 
circumscribed if these images were long withheld. A 

o o 

baby brother died about this time, and I remember 
how earnestly and sadly I speculated upon his fate — 
how I used to sleep in the fervent hope he would 
come to me in dreams. He never did, and I used to 
have strange questionings as to whether, when he was 
such a little one, he might not have been caught on 
his way to heaven by some evil spirit, and that was 
why I did not see him in sleep ; and then I used to 
pray that God would find him, and take care of him, 
and love him. I used to wonder how the sun could 
shine, and the birds sing, when perhaps his clear, 
sweet little soul might be suffering. It looked strange 
to me to see people eat and go on in the world as 
they did, when everything was gloomy and stood still, 
as it were, to me. I used to go out and think of the 
moon shining upon his little grave, so cold, still, such 
a sad change from our warm room. I let the snow 
and the rain chill me, because he was chilled ; and 
wept myself ill again and again, and yet did not see 
him in my sleep. It seemed as if the whole universe 
was changed, and become black and miserable, and 
that after all, people do not live after they left this 
world. I dared not express this skepticism, because 
it grew out of my dreams, an experience I rarely in- 
trusted to any ear. 

How little do people know of the mind of a child ! 



28 INFANT DOUBT. • 

How little is its world, self-created, understood ! 
There is such, a clear, quiet rejection as false, of all 
that is beyond its comprehension ; while it frames to 
itself a state perfectly consistent and harmonious. 
Childrens' questionings mean much more, too, than 
they are supposed ; it is a mistake to be always put- 
ting children into shape, as if the good Father would 
not look after the needs of the spirit he has made. I 
remember the grave answers of a child of six years, to 
whom I had been pointing out some of the constella- 
tions, which led to a talk upon the Infinite and 
Eternal. 

He held my hands firmly, lest a thread of his 
childish logic should be lost. "Now," he says, "I 
believe in God, because we can think of him ; and I 
believe we have souls, though we can't see them, be- 
cause we can't see a thought, and yet we know what 
it is ; and our souls must live after our bodies die, 
because there is nothing in them to die, any more 
than in a thought ; but, oh dear, dear, (and here his 
tears gushed to his relief), if it is a suck in, what a 
dreadful suck in, it must be." 

The child had exhausted his spiritual vocabulary, 
and was obliged to find expression in the language of 
the play-ground ; but how full of far-reaching thought 
must the child have been, to evolve such depth of 
feeling ! 

To resume — my sleep at this time helped me in a 

/variety of ways. I used to read my school exercises 

over night, and in the morning I rarely failed to know 

them perfectly. Indeed, it must be confessed, I have 

always trusted much to aid in this way ; whatever 



HEEBS OF GRACE. 29 

has worried or perplexed me I have confidently 
looked to dreamland for elucidation. Once having 
some favorite plants, which became infested with 
aphides, I was greatly troubled to get rid of them. 
One night I dreamed I was watering my plants with 
an infusion of wormwood, which entirely destroyed 
these insects. I tried the experiment, and, as I be- 
lieve, with success. But I think the deeper lesson 
that came to me was, that the bitter, or "herbs 01 
grace," are exempt from these sweet-loving epicures — ■ 
they spread forth their strong, healthful, and cleanly 
branches, to the sun and air, unmolested by any but 
the poor invalid, to whom they are a life-giving need. 
Then to him they grow beautiful, while my roses and 
geraniums, beautiful to all eyes, attract, not only me, 
but instincts of a lower order. Loving, fading, 
illusive, are they ; while " herbs of grace" honestly 
present their bitter aspect, and leave nothing to 
deplore. A blessing on the roses, nevertheless ; one 
can afford to bear the pain of their thorns for the 
sake of their delights. 



Cfjupin tfjrirt 



We wandered, underneath the young grey down, 
And multitudes of dense white fleecy clouds 
Were wandering in thick nocks along the mountains, 
Shepherded by the slow, unwilling wind ; 
* * * * 

And there was more, which I remember not. — Shelly. 

Confessions continued — Soul State prefigured— Prophetic Dreams — The Body of the 
Resurrection — The Grief Child. 



The spiritualism of Bunyan affected me strongly at 
this period. I remember, too, having read at this 
time " Allen's Appeal to the Unconverted," feeling 
all the time that the fervent cry of exhortation could 
not mean a case like mine, yet it exhorted to a some- 
thing of desirable attainment, and I was only terrified 
lest I should fail to secure it ; and so I used to 
pray that I might be converted, if I was not already 
so, and dreamed of being in search of something, the 
exact nature of which I was not able to define ; but it 
was a great and wearisome work, up toilsome ways, 
and through sad and solitary paths. 

Never did poor Christian carry a heavier burden 
than I struggled under in my sleep. Gradually this 
disappeared, and I was forever wandering alone 
through strange scenes, and seeking some mystic good, 



ONWARD AND UPWARD. 31 

not very clearly revealed to my mind. Then this 
state of dreaming changed, and I began with toilsome 
labor to ascend high mountains. This was a great 
comfort to me. I associated it with the City set on a 
Hill, and now I felt assured there was no wrong in the 
disposition I felt to look at the dogmas presented to 
me, and make up my own estimate of the amount of 
truth they contained ; for did not the action of my 
soul in sleep show I was going upward and onward ? 
I longed to sleep, that I might realize more vividly 
this noble tendency. I dreamed of singing hymns, 
and hearing music steal from amid the hills, and when 
I sometimes lost the way, majestic beings took me by 
the hand and led me onward. 

At one time I found myself on the shores of a great 
lake. It was nearly dark, and my way was across. 
I could see no boat nor conveyance of any kind. At 
length I discerned three causeways, one leading to the 
right, one to the left, and one straight onward. The 
right and left paths were filled with people very joyous, 
and I could discern trees and flowers, and music; 
while the central path was so narrow that it was 
barely a foot-path — barren, forlorn, and apparently 
without end. This path I took, and was advancing 
slowly on my lonely way — weak, terrified, and weep- 
ing — when the guide, of whom I so often dreamed, 
took my hand gently, and led me on till I came to 
where the path diverged again to the right and left, 
with the same narrow causeway stretching across the 
waste, when I found myself again alone. The two 
other ways were filled, as before, with happy people 
and pleasing objects ; but once more I took the straight 



32 MY FATHER. 

path, and again my calm, silent, unfailing guide took 
me by tlie hand and led me onward, till a third time 
the path diverged, and I was left to my own unbiased 
choice in the way before me. I grew weary and faint, 
yet my steps sought once more the narrow causeway, 
and again my calm guide took me by the hand, till a 
vista of glory and beauty dazzled my eyes, and I 
awoke, repeating, " Turn neither to the right hand nor 
the left." 

This personage, with whom I became so conversant 
in my sleep, I always associated with my father, who 
died while I was a mere infant, believing him to be 
the spirit sent to lead me onward — and thus my filial 
reverence grew into a sublime religious emotion. 
* Dreams like these wear the aspect of invention, and 
sound like allegories, yet they were not such to me ; but 
I regarded them as facts in my internal life, indica- 
tions of the state of my soul. It would fill volumes to 
record my experience in this way. I visited foreign 
countries, became familiar with all the wonders of 
architecture throughout the world ; the Pyramids of 
Egypt, and the ruins of Thebes, seen always by moon- 
light, as if the great shadows of ages had invested them 
with a moony atmosphere into which I wandered. I 
went to the Yalley of Jehoshaphat, and saw the vast 
multitude of bones bleaching in the sun ; and there I 
saw a beautiful marble obelisk, with a pretty rivulet 
flowing beside it ; this was the pillar which Absalom 
was said to have set up. 

At length I dreamed of being in a great storm ; the 
road was obstructed with fallen trees ; I was alone and 



THE CRYSTAL PALACE. 33 

drenched with rain. It was pitch dark, &nd I could 
hear the roar of the river over which my way led, as 
if it had burst its bounds. I struggled onward, led 
by faint gleams of light, till I came to a bridge. The 
foaming torrent had risen above it, and I grew doubt- 
ful whether it was not entirely carried away ; but I 
went resolutely onward, till at length I saw that the 
centre of the bridge was gone, the river sweeping 
unobstructed through. There was nothing left for 
me but to go onward, as I felt the whole fabric sink- 
ing beneath me. I plunged into the stream, when 
instantly I found myself on the opposite shore, where 
the loveliest light was diffused, and green trees cast 
pleasant shadows upon hill sides, and flowers were 
the earth, and perfume the air. I went delightedly 
onward, saying, " there are shadows in heaven," and 
feeling blessed at the idea, and thinking to myself 
there is no dust here ; for the scene wore an aspect of 
ineffable freshness and beauty. 

Then I came to a great white palace, which seemed 
to extend column beyond column as far as the eye 
could reach, and these were festooned with vines, and 
lovely with flowers. The texture of these columns 
arrested my attention by their pure translucency, and 
I clasped my hands around them, striving in vain to 
think what they were akin to upon earth. I thought 
of alabaster and pearl, and opaque gems, but nothing 
satisfied the conception. 

I ascended the steps and walked onward, with the 

soft air stirring around me, when, suddenly I beheld a 

joyous group approaching, and recognized the dear 

ones who had gone before me to the world of spirits. 

2* 



34 THE GLORIFIED BODY. 

After this I grew tranquil in regard to my spiritual 
state, and felt quite safe in the little heresies I was 
supposed to have adopted, for I was confident I had 
seen heaven. 

How tame and ineffective seems our written poetry 
to that of our dreams, when the breathing becomes 
melodious, and the internal meanings of words grow 
into the most beautiful and profound utterance ! A 
dreamer of poetrjr can never be filled with conceit at 
his own manifestations in that branch of art, because 
the poems of the " Night Watches" are infinitely be- 
yond anything he can grasp in his waking hours, 
when the whole soul seems to swell and undulate in 
melody, and his words glow with the inspirations of 
supernal spheres, and he vies with the infinite in 
creative beauty. 

Often in our dreams we lay hold of clearer demon- 
strations in regard to our soul-nature, more vivid, 
profound, accordant, than we should have reached by 
any and the hardest labor of deduction. 

At one time I thought I had just died, and was 
undergoing the resurrection. I did not dream of 
being apart from myself, and yet I could see myself 
as one sees an object removed from him ; I did not 
look into a glass, nor water, nor any transparent 
object, and yet I saw myself in the same way. The 
first thing that arrested my attention after death was 
my improved looks, so much more beautiful than I 
had conceived human beings could look ; then I ob- 
served the skin, the texture of which was like the 
finest and whitest net- work ; next the nerves, a perfect 



SPIEITUAL ANATOMY. 35 

forest of them, but beautiful in themselves, like 
threads of pearl ; next I saw the bones, and these were 
of the purest ivory. Palpable as these parts were, 
they were exquisitely beautiful to the eye, and made 
up a floating, transparent, white shape, affecting me 
with a sense of pleasure ; but within all these — breath- 
ing, and diffused through all, and making up the 
solidness of what here, in this world, is flesh and 
blood, for I saw none in my dream — was a rosy light 
that seemed to live of itself, and imparting complete- 
ness to the whole body. I w^as repeating, when I 
awoke, " we shall not all die, but we shall be changed 
in a moment, in the twinkling of an eye." 

Awake, with malice prepense, we should not have 
put together a spiritual anatomy in this way, all in 
harmony, complete, and yet beautiful, without wings, 
naked, and yet unconscious as the inmates of Eden 
when they walked in their innocency before Grod ; we 
should have tried in vain to imagine the pure imma- 
terial body analogous to this, on earth, and yet fit for 
the saints in light. 

Virgil's description of the unhappy Dido bearing the 
pangs of her desertion into dreamland, and wandering 
through lonely and difficult paths, is full of pathos. 
Then too the queenly air with which she turns proud- 
ly away from the recreant lover, bearing into the 
world of spirits the sense of injury, is so suggestively 
true to some continuit}^, that we wonder where the 
fine old heathen picked up his sentimentality. 

Every one who has read Jane Eyre will remember 
the author's description of Jane, wandering, desolate 



36 THE GKIEF CHILD. 

and stricken, through her weary dreams, bearing a 
child in her arms, which she could not lay aside, but 
carried on, though faint with fatigue. The whole 
scene has that genuine stamp that could come only 
through the author's own experience. The supersti- 
tion is old, and almost universal, that to dream of car- 
rying a child in your arms is portentous of grief, and 
grief coming through the affections. So often has this 
dream preceded some calamity, that I have learned to 
look tenderly upon my Grief Child, as I call it, and 
even in sleep to recognize its face, and caress it mourn- 
fully. The Grief Child, borne in the bosom, before the 
climax of external sorrow, has grown dear to me, 
with its white, sweet face half veiled in clustering 
locks, wavy but not curling, with strange, unearthly 
eyes, fixed half mournfully upon mine ; and clinging 
to me with a sorrowful tenacity, as if it owed its brief 
existence to my destiny, and dreaded to be cast off. 
Once I dreamed of carrying my Grief Child to the bap- 
tism, up the long aisles of a cathedral, moving slowly 
to the music of a dirge. At the altar I met bear- 
ing a Grief Child also. Holy water was spinkled 
upon their faces, and we gave the children our own 
names, both of us weeping bitterly. When these 
names were pronounced they were strange, and yet 
sweet sounding words which dreamed were the celes- 
tial meanings of our own. I have since tried in vain 
to recall the words, but they are lost to me. 

THE GRIEF CHILD, 

Two stood before an altar : in a land 

Made up of shadowy dreams, and many tears, 



SONNET. 37 

Emotions counting ages not fleet years, 

And there, in old Cathedral, hand in hand, 

Amid deep peeling anthems from a band 

Of unseen chanters, which the spirit hears, 

Each with a burdened breast the altar nears; 

Gleams of commingled angels round them stand, 

As each, for its baptismal water, bears 

A Grief Child, pale, and hushed, and weirdly sweet, 

•Long nursed in secret, now to God resigned. 

All self-renounced, they kneel with holy prayers 

And lay the fair Grief Child at Jesus' feet, 

Then to their Earth-Task wend with willing mind. 



CjmpUr /nttrtjr. 



Sleep hath its own "world, 
And a wide realm of wild reality, 
And dreams in their development have breath, 
And tears, and tortures, and the touch of joy ; 
They leave a weight upon our waking thoughts, 
They take a weight from off our waking toils ; 
They pass like spirits of the past — they speak 
Like Sibyls of the future. — Byron. 

Byron — Congested Brain — Gunshot Wound — Socrates — Wisdom is Music — Milton's 
— Sonnet Prayer — A Decision 

Bykon must have been a most magnificent dreamer. 
Much of his poetry is evidently drawn from the fevered 
action of his sleep-life ; the wild, passionate dreaming 
of a spirit hardly able to separate his dream-life from 
the actual. It affects me always like one of my own, 
too vivid, intense visions, that, like miraculous food, 
carries me on in the strength of it through long 
periods of suffering. 

It was pitiless to meet the o'er-burdened sensitive- 
ness of Byron with the stale saws of common-life — 
the child of the whirlwind and rocked in the tempest, 
must be adjudged by the laws of the fiery elements, 
not by those of ordinary mortals. His life was one 
long fervid dream; for he lived ages in his few years, 
centuries of emotion, and eternities of suffering. 



DROWNING. 39 

It would be a nice question for a physician to deter- 
mine the point of sanity in some cases of over dream- 
action. The little girl, so often cited by phrenologists 
who, by some accident of the head, had a portion of 
the skull removed, thus exposing the pulsations of 
the brain, was an active dreamer, and when these 
were vivid the brain swelled under the injured part, 
almost protruding through the membrane, and then sub- 
siding, just in proportion as her visions were more or 
less vivid. I do not like to admit that dreams may be 
caused by a conjested state of the brain, although this 
must be the occasion of some species of dreams. It- 
is well known that persons in drowning, but who have 
survived the peril, attest to the vivid action of memory 
after all consciousness of suffering had ceased. I have 
heard my mother relate often the experience of my 
father in this way, who came very near death, but 
was eventually restored. He said everything in his 
past life, the most important as well as the more tri- 
vial, came back fresh to his memory — clear and dis- 
tinct as when the events occurred in life, with this 
difference — he saw it all before him, knew it was his 
own experience, hut was divested of any emotion in 
regard to it. He felt neither pleasure nor pain, satis- 
faction nor regret — they were simple facts again brought 
into notice, even the child-mischief with all the old 
localities painted, as it were, upon the soul. One 
scene was that in which he saw himself and brothers 
out behind the barn, singing some songs of a more 
hilarious and rampant character than the strict ob- 
servances of Puritaic life would justify. 



40 THE POETS. 

Sir John Barrow records a like experience, all the 
events of his life being thus vividly reproduced : but 
afterwards having fainted from a gun-shot wound, he 
was subject to no such phenomenon. To me, it 
seems obvious, that in the one case there was conges- 
tion of the brain, the blood acting as a stimulant, (and 
this does not in the least lessen the singularity of the 
fact, does not make it in the least less wonderful), and 
in the other the blood was suddenly drained from the 
brain, depriving it of even ordinary stimulant- In some 
dreams it is probable the brain may be in a state analo- 
gous to one or other of the states described in drowning, 
or in the prostration of the gun-shot wound. But in 
drowning no faculty seemed to have been imparted 
except that of reminiscence, and a very small portion 
of our dreams belong to this order. 

I apprehend Wordsworth dreams little — Shelley is 
full of dreams — the very Ariel of Poets, breathing of 
ambrosia and the thin atmosphere of his shadowy 
Asia and Panthea, and lost at the golden gates like 
his own sky lark ; beautiful himself, and loving the 
beautiful, unlike his Sensitive Plant. 

" It desires, what it has not, the beautiful." 

The dreams of Coleridge and De Quincey, after all, 
are not of any value as psychological phenomena, 
from the fact that they were produced by stimulants, 
and were therefore a partial congestion of the brain. 
It is true, in the case of those remarkable men there 
must have been wonderful compass of brain, which 
the stimulant put into action ; this becomes obvious 
when we compare it with the beautiful, but more 



MORNING DREAMS. 41 

limited construction of Lamb, whose quaint but honest 
admission, "I am ashamed of the poverty of my 
dreams," brings the man so very near to the common 
heart. But then, Lamb must have schooled himself 
not to dream, must have dreaded any extraordinary 
action of the brain, as too nearly allied to the dread- 
ful disease that hung like a gorgon head to terrify 
his sensitive nerves. Alas ! Lamb's life was too ter- 
ribly real to admit of the luxury of dreams. 

The ancients believed that morning dreams were 
from Apollo, and therefore prophetic. Hence, Soc- 
rates, condemned to die, awaited in prison the return 
of the sacred ship from Delos, which would be the 
signal for his execution. " It will arrive to-morrow, 
when you must die," exclaimed one of his friends. " I 
shall not die so soon," answered Socrates, " for so I 
conjecture from a dream / had this morning. I thought 
I saw a very handsome, comely woman, clad in white, 
who, calling me by name, said, ' In three days thou 
shalt be in the fruitful Phthia. 7 " 

Again, Socrates said, "all my life I have had 
dreams, which recommended the same things to me, 
sometimes in one way, sometimes in another. ' Socrates,' 
they said, ' apply yourself to music :' this I took for 
a simple exhortation for me pursue wisdom^ which has 
been the study of my life, and is the most perfect 
music" 

Milton has given us a beautiful evidence of the 
vividness of his dreams, which he thought not un- 
worthy to be thrown into one of his exquisite Sonnets ; 
and there it stands harping a-down the centuries, a 
beautiful psychological testimony, and a lovely monu- 



42 SONNET OF MILTON. 

ment to a most lovely woman, or Milton would never 
thus have recorded this evidence of soul-companion- 
ship. 

ON HIS DECEASED WIFE. 

Methought I saw my late espoused saint 
Brought to me like Alcestis from the grave, 
Whom Jove's great son for her glad husband gave, 

Rescued from death by force, though pale and faint. 

Mine, as whom wash'd from spot of child-bed taint 
Purification in the old law did save, 
And such, as yet once more I trust to have 

Full sight of her in Heav'n without restraint, 
Came vested all in white, pure as her mind : 

Her face was veiled, yet to my fancied sight 
Love, sweetness, goodness in her person shined 

So clear, as in no face, with more delight. 
But 0, as to embrace me she inclined, 

I waked, she fled, and day brought back my night. 

The visions of Jacob Behman and Swedenborg are 
classed by some minds as akin to, if not altogether the 
action of an insane element, while others rank them as 
reveries or dreams. Whether we accept their views 
as revelations or not, this mode of meeting minds of 
such an extraordinary cast is certainly weak and un- 
just. Few thinkers of any age have been able to pile 
up arguments at such length, and sustain them with 
such coherency as the latter of these writers ; and where 
this is the case, the class of men, who admit the autho- 
rity of Shakspeare in matters of less moment, should 
allow his judgment weight in regard to the great 
mystic. 



FEAR OF ISOLATION". 43 

" It is not madness, 
That I have uttered : bring me to the test, 
And I the matter will reword; which madness 
Would gambol from." 

We must look upon these men as creatures distinct 
and entire, and holding a higher relation to certain 
kinds of truths than men of ordinary construction. It 
is probable that many of us are conscious of intervals 
in which our organization acts in a manner analogous 
to theirs, but which we are not willing to accept as 
revelations. We reject and cast aside, struggle against 
these, fearful and doubting, and the consequence is, if 
our self-will is more urgent than the revelation, we sink 
into deeper darkness ; if the revelation be great, and 
our worldliness greater, insanity supervenes and ends 
the struggle. Few dare to look cordially and man- 
fully at these intimations of the spirit, which, if ac- 
cepted, may remove them in some degree from human 
sympathy. 

I remember at one time to have been greatly exer- 
cised upon the subject of prayer. A sense, well nigh 
bordering upon disgust, came over me at listening to 
the smooth common-place complaisant petitions of the 
pulpit, sometimes aimed at the congregation, and some- 
times mere specimens of rhetoric ; while the earnest, 
fervid, but often irregular prayers of some minds 
seemed to be in full accordance with human needs. I 
debated much in my own mind, and then settled down 
into the belief that a passive recipiency was the desira- 
ble state ; that to hold the whole soul subject to the 
will of the Infinite, without any eclecticism of desire 



44 A VISION. 

either in regard to the goods or the evils of life, was 
the true and acceptable frame of mind. I thought 
much upon this and fell into a state ; I did not sleep 
nor dream, I was not unconscious, but the state was 
beyond myself. 

I seemed to be in the midst of a great mass of peo- 
ple — an infinite number of all ages — we moved steadily 
and tranquilly forward ; there was neither jostling nor 
noise, nor depression, nor joy, but a calm, notunpleas- 
ing, and yet it grew terrible to myself. I felt as if I 
might suffocate ; I looked upon every side and saw 
the mass of heads, and each free, passive, content, and 
yet aimless in look. The more I realized this repose 
of soul, which seemed nearly ideal to me, the more 
deadening did it become, and I suddenly cried out, 
" Oh God deliver me from this terrible doom." In- 
stantly I arose head and shoulders above the mass, and 
the vistas opened into gleams of ravishing beauty. I 
had but a glimpse when a voice said, " this is prayer," 
and the whole scene changed. 

Now I could not have been over a moment in this 
state, I knew by what transpired around me, and yet 
I seemed to have passed through ages of experience, 
I had time for every shade of emotion. 



CJrapfrr /iftjr. 



Of the great multitude of Dreams which are, for the most part, confused and un- 
meaning, some occasionally stand out from the rest, extremely clear and well- 
connected, in which the feelings oftentimes discover a profound significance. — 
Schlegel's Phil, f Life. 

A Beautiful Vision — Face Expression — Daniel Webster — Oliver Cromwell — The 
Unfulfilled Mision— My Dream Foe. 

I have said that visions, for I know not what else 
to call them, — nothing can come from nothing — are 
not infrequent. I remember a clerical friend related 
to me an experience of his own, somewhat akin to 
the one I have related in the last chapter ; but more 
beautifully significant. I would give the name, but am 
not sure that he is willing to be identified with ex- 
periences of the kind, although the claims of the mys- 
tical and spiritual are a very urgent part of his charac- 
ter, being allied, as it is, to a high poetic tempera- 
ment. 

He was not sleeping, nor ill, when he fell into what 
might be called the trance condition. He seemed to 
be moving onward with a vast and silent multitude 
but I did not understand that he was -disaffected or 
pained at the uniform and steady progress of the 
mass. With an instinctive action he looked tqi, and 



46 FLITTING INWAKD. 

• 

beheld a mass of beings above the heads of those in the 
midst of whom he moved, advancing in the same 
manner. As he looked up. the being above his own 
head said to him, " You have waked up: there is not 
one in ten thousand that does so." 

This was very significant ; and one so favored is 
not likely to be unmindful of the heavenly vission. 

As we advance in life, our faces become expres- 
sive of oar spiritual or moral experiences — there are 
some of whom it might be said, they have set their 
faces like a rock, so hard and material do they be- 
come ; others are mere sensualists ; and others again 
mere masks. Nothing is so perplexing, and so like a 
wall, so far as insight is concerned, as the human 
countenance is capable of becoming. There are those 
again, whose expression recedes inward, as if a thin 
lovely veil intervened between it and the observer, 
which is both modest and attractive, and indicates 
something beyond ordinary manifestations. 

" Thine eyes are like wells of unfathomed light, 
Or deep mysterious waves in which I gaze, 
Yet find a depth beyond, sealed from my reach." 

These have a weired unearthly nature which may, 
or may not be akin to the heavenly. To whatever 
sphere we may belong, we, most of us, have an in- 
stinctive, protective self-dom, which will not be in- 
vaded by mere curiosity however readily it may 
respond to true relations. 

I have often wondered at the coarseness with which 
people will scrutinize a beautifully expressive face — 



DANIEL WEBSTEK. 47 

to me, it seems, the more sensitive is the organization, 
the more holy should it be in the eye of the observer ; 
and we should respect that undraping, as it were, of a 
fine spirit, that seems more than half restored to the 
primal Eden. 

I remember when I was a child I felt it to be a 
cruel injury when I detected, as I sometimes did, a 
willingness on the part of friends to play upon my 
sensibilities ; and this, I fear, is too often done with 
children — too often converting them into little affecta- 
tion, and falsehoods, or rendering them timid and 
reserved. 

There is no question that dreams affect the expres- 
sion of the face. Often 

" The bosom's lord sits lightly on his throne," 

simply because of a pleasant dream. We cannot help 
it — we dislike people who dream of eating and drink- 
ing, and of vermin, reptiles, huge serpents, and other 
prototypes of evil. These are gross natures, or 
envious and malicious ones, with knit brows, com- 
pressed lips, and cadaverous countenances. Your 
bad dreamer is a bad man. He may not admit it ; 
but his true sphere becomes obvious by the experiences 
of his sleep. These people grow old prematurely, 
and assimilate in looks to the creatures of their 
dreams. 

I would give much to know the nature of Daniel 
Webster s dreams ; for I am sure, with eyes like his, 
he is predisposed, at least, to the dream spirit. Mi- 
chael or Lucifer must visit his night watches, which- 



48 IMPISH DREAMS. 

ever part of his nature being in the ascendant, in- 
viting the one or the other; for with him, pre- 
eminently, " to be weak would be to be miserable." 

Oliver Cromwell, in the early part of his career, 
while his vast powers were as yet unmarshailed rank 
and file, but were tumultuous giants, moving here and 
there ; gloomy for lack of occasion, and painful in the 
process of growth, must have been a hard dreamer ; 
for we find his waking hours disturbed by the pressure 
of what is called hypochondriacism — visions of the 
mind, which were but indistinct prototypes of the 
coming man. When the man of dreams became the 
man of action, and of action in harmony with the 
great struggle within, I apprehend he ceased to dream, 
nearly if not quite ; for his active body, and the 
busy urgency of the times, kept the life experience 
equal to the soul intimations. 

Your cowardly actor, your men or women, whose 
life falls short of the internal convictions ; who fear to 
achieve a mission, have fragmentary dreams — little 
indistinct, impish kind of visions ; are always tumbling 
into ditches; pursued by wild beasts; falling from 
towers, or pitching down stairs. Their sleep is in ac- 
cordance with their waking life, without purpose and 
without dignity. The external appearance of that 
kind of people suffers terribly by the action of a 
meagre life and distorted dreams ; and they have an 
uncertain sort of unfinished look ; a pinched face or 
figure, as if nature, perceiving no growth in the 
spirit, supplied her aliment grudgingly. 

The best of us, those who dream best, and live 



THE DREAM FOE. 49 

nearest to our deepest convictions, leave still half the 
capacities of our being undeveloped ; and where this 
is the case, there are always shadowy intimations, 
more or less powerful, which should stimulate to action, 
as the assurance of a something yet in store for us. 
After the period of childhood, dreams are so much a 
part of the biography of the individal, that they must 
be used cautiously. The following lines are the simple 
record of a dream, thrown into verse the next morn- 
ing. It was a most vivid and startling vision, and 
the face of the woman remains fixed upon my fancy. 
As yet I have not seen its counterpart, though she is 
one I have seen more than once in sleep, always 
vindictive, sometimes with an oriental turban upon 
her head, sometimes a veil, and sometimes with masses 
of short black curls. 



THE DREAM FOE. 

Saddest dream I dreamed last night, 

Of a lady large and fair, 
Noble was she more than bright 

Crowned with locks of ebon hair. 

Three times did I slumber weary, 
Three times I with terror woke, 

For the weird shape, stern and dreary, 
From my lids the slumber broke. 

One strong hand upon my shoulder, 
One upheld a dagger's gleam ; 

Touch of death was never colder 
Than the lady's of my dream. 



50 THE DREAM FOE. 

Eyes that flashed like livid lightning, 
Springing feet with sudden start, 

And the dagger came down brightening, 
Piercing deeply to my heart. 

Prom the bosom of the future, 
Folded like the unborn child, 

Mothers know in every feature, 
Ere its life on earth have smiled, 

I shall know that shape and bearing, 
Know the deadly flashing eye, 

Searching, cold, and all unsparing, 
Though a thousand forms were nigh. 



Cljaptn luijj. 

"They resemble the soothsayers of old, "who dealt in dark hints and doubtful ora- 
cles ; and I should like to ask them the meaning of what no mortal but themselves 
oan fathom." — Charles Lamb. 

Edgar A. Poe ; Presaging Eyes ; Swooning ; A Dream. 

Your true poet is always a dreamer. I know not 
what to make of Edgar A. Poe. Nature had given 
him the eye of a dreamer, and the intuitions of a be- 
liever, (I use the word in its broad sense), but a slight 
overbalance of the intellect was enough to destroy the 
beautiful harmony originally designed. His fictions 
have a malice prepense about them, and we instinc- 
tively reject what had produced no illusion in his own 
mind. I think he must have ceased to dream early in 
life, for a good dreamer has something cordial and prim- 
itive in his make, a touch of the child, by which all 
faith is pleasing to him ; and like the child, he is in a 
very agony of desire to believe. I do not mean to say 
he is a mere reed shaken by the wind, for, on the con- 
trary, there is a hardy consolidation in the mind of the 
true poet as yet but little understood ; but being of 
" imagination all compact," he is able to bring autho- 
rity from higher and broader sources than other men, 
and from his greater power of insight he perceives ana- 



52 PRESAGING EYES. * 

logies quite lost to the rest of the world ; hence that 
which is blind superstition in other minds is to him but 
a penetrating of mysteries, a look within the veil, and 
a perception of the signs of the times. Your poet 
who comes before the public like a juggler, hoping to 
dupe it, with that in which he himself has no faith, 
is deserving of contempt. There is a harmony in the 
conditions assumed by the poet, which creates an illu- 
sion in the writer's own mind, and thence creates a re- 
sponse in the mind of his reader. 

It is interesting to note the peculiarity of eye in a 
class of thinkers and actors in the world. They carry 
about them something mystical and presaging, so that 
to look upon them we should anticipate a mournful 
experience. We see in their melancholy depths the 
brooding of a destiny, the Cassandra pang of one in- 
stinct with mysterious truth uttered in pain to unbe- 
lieving and unsympathizing ears. The sensuality of 
Byron too often clouded the clearness of his vision, 
and Coleridge, 

" The rapt one with the god-like forehead," 

by attempting to enhance the vividness of his percep- 
tion by the use of opium M an offering of strange fire" 
upon the spiritual altar, rendered his views misty and 
uncertain, yet both were remarkable for the sad lonely 
expression, which grew upon them, when left a mo- 
ment to themselves. Shelly 's eyes were always raised 
when engaged in thought or conversation which in- 
terested him. In the remarkable portrait of the Cen- 
ci, the artist has preserved this expression of "the 



SPIEITUAL BODY. 53 

shadows of a coming doom," the deep-set spiritual eye 
seeming to gather its light from a source foreign to its 
earthly surroundings. Vandyke's well-known picture 
of Charles the First, presents the same aspect of eye, 
the look of one impelled by fate. I remember a child 
of four years was listening to the conversation of a 
lady, with eyes such as we have described, suddenly 
she stopped, for she perceived the child to be weeping, 
" Why do you cry, my dear," she inquired. His reply 
indicated wonderful sensitiveness, "I don't know," he 
said, " but looking into your eyes makes the tears 
come into mine." 



P RE SAGING- EYE8. 

There are, who from their cradle bear 

The impress of a grief, 
Eyes, that a mystic radiance wear, 

And looks that ask relief; 

The shadows of a coming doom 

Of sorrow or of strife. 
When Fates conflicting round the loom 

Wove the sad web of life. 

Thus in the Cenci's mournful eye 

Prophetic visions gleam, 
Where folded shapes in shadow he, 

Like one in troublous dream. 

And He, from whose unkingiy hand. 

His stern compeers bereft 
The sacred truncheon of command, 

And him all crownless left. 



54 SWOONING. 

Beneath his large and curtained lid, 

Eeceding lights appear, 
Like those, where ancient graves are hid 

By moss-grown abbey near. 

And Shelly, song-inspired boy, 

Pierced by Apollo's dart, 
Within his eyes are beams of joy 

Quenched by a breaking heart. 

A god-like spirit brooding deep 

O'er earth's chaotic wrong, 
Till, like the music of our sleep, 

He breathes, and it is song. 

Oh ! Eyes, strange Eyes ! ye have a world 

Where unseen spirits tread. 
Upon whose banners half unfurled 

The future may be read. 

This prefiguring of life by our very bones and mus- 
cles, this answering of the body to the spirit, this re- 
sponse of the face to the soul beneath, seems to me 
quite as marvellous as any experience we may have in 
dreams. It is the configuration of the spiritual body, 
of which St. Paul speaks with such assurance, making 
itself manifest, and we see within the veil as it were, 
and are able to determine without slander to what 
sphere ourselves and others belong ; for some do as 
assuredly dwell in the hells as others do in the hea- 
vens, even in this world. 

There are other states akin, and yet unlike the na- 
tural action of the life in dreaming. I refer to that 
state of partial swoon, into which many persons fall 
from some action of the system. It is not a state of epe- 



A VIVID DREAM. 55 

lepsy, nor yet of total unconsciousness, as in ordinary 
fainting. 

I remember hearing a judicial friend describe with 
great clearness, his own experience in this way. He 
was subject, for some time, to attacks of this kind. 
He said that during their action, he was conscious of 
new and beautiful experiences, totally unlike what had 
transpired in his life. The scenery, the actors, all were 
distinct, yet all in perfect keeping ; and what was sin- 
gular, when he came out of them, as he did in a short 
time, he left parts of the Swoon Drama incomplete, 
which was resumed at the next swoon precisely where 
it had before left off. 

I, myself, experienced something of the kind from 
having suddenly swooned at seeing a lady bled. I 
was insensible for a long time, colorless, and pulseless, 
but not convulsed. When I came to myself, I had 
vivid recollections of a beautiful country to which T 
had been, and of listening to the most ravishing music. 
States like these may perhaps be caused by sudden 
congestion, but that does not do away the mystery of 
experience, which must be sought somewhere distinct 
from the material blood and nerves. At least distinct 
from the grosser material. I do not know but the 
following dream may belong to this class, though at 
the time I was in good health, and my sleep natural. 

A DREAM. 

I thought I had passed, without pain, the portals of 
the grave — I stood in a gray, not blue atmosphere, 
which extended above, below, and upon every side of 



56 DREAM TRIUMPH. 

me: I looked upward, downward, to the right and 
the left, where it extended into limitless space, the 
which my eyes penetrated with a continually growing 
power of vision, till they ached at the immensity and 
the solitude. There was neither sun, not star, nor 
shape of any kind. An intense loneliness made me 
shudder and cling my arms to my breast, as if, in the 
communings of my own soul, companionship would 
arise. At length a shield, light and translucent, was 
put into my hands, and a voice said, but still I saw 
no one — " Guard thyself with this, and whatsoever thou 
cansH not walk over and subdue is thy companion, and 
kindred with thee. 11 

Then meseemed I went on, covered only with this 
shield, which was without weight and most beautiful. 
Oh! the inexpressible rapture there was in motion. 
Now I trod proudly and buoyantly forward, with a 
sense of power and a sense of delight, which no lan- 
guage can paint. Anon I leaned upon space, and 
floated, as if every limb and fibre were exultant with 
motion. Then I recalled past dreams and said to 
myself aloud, and my voice was a new source of 
pleasure — " When I was in the material world, I used 
often to dream that angels and spirits had no wings, 
and now I find it true — and I am so glad — it is so 
much nobler, so much more beautiful and free, to 
move by the force of Will only." 

Thus I went onward folding my arms, and the way 
brightening before me, though I saw nothing from 
which the light proceeded. At length I was con- 
scious of a sharp pang, as if innumerable stings had 



DREAM TRIUMPH. 57 

penetrated every fibre ; I bethought myself of my 
shield and spread it before me, for the light had 
grown to a purple redness, and right under my feet 
I saw a creature who seemed one mass of flame, a 
burning coal as it were, huge, and darting spears of 
heat upon every side. I said, " Surely I have nothing 
akin to this loathsome shape," and I walked, not 
without pain, over his prostrate form. 

Then I went onward again, encountering five others, 
each more terrible in shape and aspect, and each more 
erect, but I observed the light was growing constantly 
more intense — less burning, but yet more penetrating, 
and causing sufferings akin to that which we feel at 
the sudden obtrusion of some painful thought. I 
walked over each and all, writhing and suffering it is 
true, yet confident of success, and constantly saying — 
"I have nothing akin to these." 

At length the light, which had been growing whiter 
all the time, became diffused in such clear brightness, 
upon every side, that I felt it not in my eyes alone, 
but as if it were a part of myself — as if I were shaped 
out of it — were all eye, and all life and light, and 
moved, still companionless, but not without joy. I 
said to myself — " People in the other world know lit- 
tle of this — that we are to test what manner of spirit 
we are of, by combat with spiritualisms." Suddenly I 
felt as if the light in which I moved were crystalized into 
the form of swords, and I cast my shield upon every 
side to save myself from wounds too terrible for en- 
durance : even in my anguish I cast about in mind 
for something comparable in the world which I had left, 
to the sense of torture I endured now, and I said : 
3* 



58 DRAGONS. 

" Oh ! I remember, in the other world mischievous 
boys in the streets would sometimes throw the light 
from a mirror suddenly in our rooms, and we recoiled 
from the pang, and now it is as if that ray were 
hardened to a sword, and become what in our Scrip- 
tures is . described as the ' sword of the Lord', and I 
repeated with painful distinctness — ' For the word of 
the Lord is quick and powerful, and sharper than any 
two-edged sword, piercing even to the dividing asun- 
der of soul and spirit, and of the joints and marrow, 
and is a discerner of the thoughts and intents of the 
heart.' " I still went onward, and there in my path lay, 
or rather up-rose a being more terrible than any I had 
hitherto seen, in shape not unlike a dragon, with in- 
numerable heads ; human they seemed, each crovmed, 
and each full of power and beauty. The creature's 
arms were myriads ; his shape, convolved and tower- 
ing, filled a vast space, and every hand was armed 
with one of those subtle swords framed out of light. 
I grew faint with pain and terror, yet determined to 
advance, for I said, 'I am not akin to this.' I plunged 
into the midst of these thousands of swords, bewildered 
by the glare of jewels, and the piercing beams of 
myriads of eyes. I held my shield upon every side. 
I pressed onward, saying to myself — ' I must not stay 
with these,' and suffering with the sharp cuts of 
wounds inflicted upon every limb, and saying, ' Oh ! 
how much more terrible than the wounds from which 
we used to shrink in the other world!' Then I tried 
to think where I had read something analogous, and 
the great Milton's fight of Michael and Satan recurred 
to my memory; I awoke repeating that wonderful 



DEPARTURE OF VISION. 59 

passage, and assenting with terrible vividness to tlie 
accuracy with which he had described the agony of 
spiritual wounds. 

"The clock struck one just as the vision departed, 
and for many moments after I opened my eyes I was 
flooded with light, but nothing visible, and then it 
passed away, leaving the night intensely dark." 



Cjraphr $tnnt\f. 



O thoughtless, why did I 
Thus violate thy slumb'rous solitude ? 
"Why should I ope thy melancholy eyes ? 

Keats. 

The Unfortunate always Superstitious — Saul of Israel — He seeks the stray Asses, and 
finds a Kingship — The Witch of Endor. 

The unfortunate are always superstitious ; just in 
proportion as the calamities of life impair the freedom 
of the human mind, do the elements of the dark and 
the mysterious gather about it. The past has been 
imbittered by care and disappointment; and, in the 
words of Scripture, their " way is hedged up," there 
is no hopeful vista to relieve the gloom of the present, 
and they appeal to omens, predictions, and the rude 
superstitions current amongst the vulgar. 

Too feeble to boldly enter the precincts of Truth, 
grasping with a strong faith the very horns of the 
altar; and thus learn how the temporary yields to 
that which is eternal ; how the partial is lost in the 
universal ; they linger about the threshold, perplexing 
themselves with dim shadows and faint intimations. 
They pause in the vestibule, where Superstition sits 
portress, rather than enter to worship Truth herself. 

It is the error of their destiny more than their own. 



SEEKING ASSES. 61 

The light that is in them has become darkness. The 
clearness and vigor of perception are lost under the 
pressure of circumstances, in which human wisdom 
would seem to be of no avail, and they yield at length 
as to an irresistible fate. 

The history of Saul, the first king of Israel, is an 
affecting record of this kind. Eaised to the dignity 
of royal power, by no ambition of his own, but by 
Divine appointment ; in compliance with the will of 
a people weary of their Theocracy, we look upon him 
from the first as an instrument, a being impelled 
rather than impelling. 

Painful, indeed, is the contrast of the proud and 
handsome youth commencing his royal career in the 
freshness and freedom of early manhood, when life 
presented but a long perspective of sunshine and ver- 
dure, to that of the stricken man, weighed down by 
calamities, bereft of hope, bereft of faith, yet manfully 
marching to that fatal field where death only had 
been promised him. 

From the commencement of his career the " choice 
young man and goodly " seems to have had a leaning 
to the occult, a willingness to avail himself of myste- 
rious power, rather than to arrive at results through 
ordinary and recognized channels. We find him 
commissioned by his father, going forth in quest of 
three stray asses, which he seeks, not by the hill-sides 
and pastures of Israel, but by consulting the seer, 
Samuel. The holy man hails him king, and gently 
rebukes him as to the object of his visit, by saying, 
u set not tlry mind upon the asses which were lost 
three days ago, for they are found." 



62 FOEBIDDEN LOEE. 

Ardent and impulsive, lie now goeth up and down 
in the spirit of prophecy, with the strange men who 
expound its mysteries, and anon he sendeth the 
bloody tokens to the tribes of Israel, rousing them 
from the yoke of oppression. 

Generous and heroic, he repels the foes of his peo- 
ple, and loads the chivalric David with princely favors. 
Yet beneath all this T like hidden waters, heard but 
unseen, lurked this dark and gloomy mysticism, that 
imbittered even his proudest and brightest hours. An 
evil spirit troubled him, which only the melody of the 
sweet psalmist of Israel could beguile. 

Moses had been familiar with all the forms of Egyp- 
tian worship, and all their many sources of knowledge ; 
but, as the promulgator of a new and holier faith, he 
wished to draw his people from the subtleties of divi- 
nation, and induce them to a direct and open reliance 
upon Him who alone "knoweth the end from the be- 
ginning." 2^o insight to the future is needed by the 
strong in faith and the strong in action. Hence the 
divinely appointed legislator prohibited all intercourse 
with those who dealt in this forbidden lore — forbidden, 
as subversive of human hope and human happiness. 
For the mind loses its tone when once impressed with 
the belief that the " shadows of coming events" have 
fallen upon it. 

The impetuous and vacillating Saul, impelled by 
an irresistible instinct to this species of knowledge, 
sought to protect himself from its influence by remov- 
ing the sources of it from his kingdom. For this rea- 
son he put in force the severe enactments of Moses 



THE WITCH OF END0K. 63 

against dealers in what were termed " familiar spirits." 
Thus betraying the infirmity of his manhood, by re- 
moving temptation rather than bravely resisting it. 

Vain and superstitious, oh " choice young man and 
goodly," thou wert no match for the rival found in 
the person of the chivalric David, the warrior poet, 
the king minstrel, the man of many crimes, yet re- 
deeming all by the fervency of his penitence, and his 
unfaltering faith in the Highest. Yet the noble and 
the heroic did never quite desert thee, even when 
thou didst implore the holy prophet to honor thee in 
the presence " of the elders of the people," and he 
turned and worshipped with thee. A kingly pageant 
when the sceptre was departing from thee. 

Disheartened by intestine troubles, appalled by fo- 
reign invasion, the spirit of the unhappy king forsook 
him, and it is said "his heart greatly trembled." 
Samuel, the stern and uncompromising revealer of 
truth, was no more. Unsustained by a hearty reliance 
upon divine things, Saul was like a reed cast upon 
the waters, in this, his hour of trial and perplexity. 

"When Saul inquired of the Lord, the Lord an- 
swered him not, neither by dreams nor by prophets." 
Unhappy man, thy prayers were those of doubt, not 
of faith, and how could they enter that which is with- 
in the veil ! 

In the utterness of his despair, he consults the 
Woman of Endor. She might not control events, 
but she could foretell them. Perilous and appalling 
as his destiny threatened, he would yet know the 
worst. 

There was majesty in thee, oh Saul! even in thy 



64 WOMANLY FEELING. 

disguise and agony, as thou didst confront thy stern 
counselor brought from the land of shadows — "the 
old man covered with a mantle." When Samuel de- 
mands, "why hast thou disquieted me?" we share in 
the desolateness and sorrow which thy answer implies. 

" Grod is departed from me, and answereth me no 
more, neither by prophets, nor by dreams, therefore 
have I called thee, that thou mayest make known unto 
me what I shall do." 

The Woman of Endor ! That is a strange perver- 
sion of taste that would represent her hideous in as- 
pect. To me she seemeth all that is genial and lovely 
in womanhood. 

So great had been the mental suffering of Saul, that 
he had fasted all that day and night, and at the terri- 
ble doom announced by the seer his strength utterly 
forsook him, and h® fell all along upon the earth. 

Now cometh the gentle ministry of the Woman of 
Endor. "Behold thou hast prevailed with me to 
hearken to thy voice, even at the peril of my life ; 
now, also, I pray thee hearken to the voice of thy 
handmaid, and let me set a morsel of bread before 
thee, and eat, that thou mayest have strength." 

Can aught be more beautiful, more touching or 
womanly in its appeal? Aught more foreign from a 
cruel and treacherous nature, aloof from human sym- 
pathies, and dealing with forbidden or unholy know- 
ledge ? 

To the Jew, trained to seek counsel only from Je- 
hovah, the Woman of Endor was a dealer with spirits 
of evil. With us, who imbibe truth through a thou- 



DAUGHTER OF THE MAGI. 65 

sand channels made turbid by prejudice and error, she 
is a distorted being allied to the hags of a wild and 
fatal delusion. We confound her with the witches of 
Macbeth, the victims of Salem, and the Moll Pitchers 
of modern days. 

Such is not the "Woman of Endor — we have adopted 
the superstition of monk and priest through the long 
era of darkness and bigotry, and every age hath lent 
a shadow to the picture. 

" Hearken to the voice of thine handmaid, and let 
me set a morsel of bread before thee." Beautiful pic- 
ture of primitive and genial hospitality ! The Woman 
of Endor riseth before me in the very attitude of her 
kind, earnest entreaty. The braids of her dark hair 
mingle with the folds of her turban ; her oriental 
robes spread from beneath the rich girdle, and the 
bust swells with her impassioned appeal. I behold 
the proud contour of her features, the deep, spiritual 
eye, the chiseled nostril, and the lip shaming the ruby. 
The cold haughty grace, becoming* the daughter of 
the Magi, hath now yielded to the tenderness of her 
woman's heart. 

Woman of Endor ! thou hast gathered the sacred 
lotus for the worship of Isis ; thou hast smoothed the 
dark- winged Ibis in the temple of the gods ; thou art 
familiar with the mysteries of the pyramids; thou 
hast quaffed the waters of the Nile, even where they 
well up in the cavernous vaults of the ancient Cheops ; 
thou hast watched the stars, and learned their names 
and courses ; art familiar with the sweet influences 
of the Pleiades, and the bands of Orion. Thy teacher 
was a reverent worshipper of nature, and thou a meek 



66 THE NEW FAITH. 

and earnest pupil. Thou heldest a more intimate com- 
munion with nature than we of a later and more 
worldly age. Thou didst work with her in her labora- 
tory, creating the gem and the pearl, and all things 
whatsoever into which the breath of life entereth not 

There was nothing of falsehood, nothing of diabolic 
power in this. Men were nearer the primitive man, 
nearer the freshness of creation, and they, who patiently 
and religiously dwelt in the temple of nature, learned 
her secrets, and acquired power hidden from the vul- 
gar, even as do the learned now, in their dim libra- 
ries, and amid their musty tomes. 

Thus was it with the Woman of Endor. She was 
learned in all the wisdom of the Bast. She had 
studied the religion of Egypt, had listened to the 
sages of Brahma, and learned philosophy in the schools 
to which the accomplished Greek afterwards resorted 
for truth and lofty aspiration ; yet even here did the 
daughter of the Magi feel the goal of truth unattained. 

She had heard of a new faith — that of Israel — a 
singular people, who at one time had sojourned in 
Egypt, and yet who went forth, leaving their gods 
and their vast worship behind, to adopt a new and 
strange belief. Hither had she come with a meek 
spirit of inquiry to learn something more of those 
great truths for which the human soul yearneth for- 
ever. 

Hence was it that her wisdom and her beauty be- 
came a shield to her, when the mandates of Saul 
banished all familiar with mysterious knowledge from 
the country. She was no trifler with the fears and 
the credulities of men. She was an earnest disciple 



MYSTIC SYMBOLS. 67 

of Truth, and guilelessly using wisdom which patient 
genius had unfolded to her mind. 

All night had she watched the stars, and firmly did 
she believe that human events were shadowed forth 
in their hushed movements. 

She compounded rare fluids, and produced creations 
wondrous in their beauty. 

There were angles described in the vast mechanism 
of nature, in the passage of the heavenly bodies, in 
the congealing of fluids, and the formation of gems, 
which were of stupendous power when used in con- 
junction with certain words of mystic meaning, 
derived from the vocabulary of spirits; spirits who 
once familiarly visited our earth, and left these sym- 
bols of their power behind them. These the*learned, 
who did so in the spirit of truth and goodness, were 
able to use, and greo,t and marvelous were the results. 

Such was the knowledge, and such the faith of the 
Woman of Endor, the wise and the beautiful daughter 
of the Magi. She was yet young and lovely ; not the 
girl nor the child, but the full, intellectual, and glori- 
ous woman. 

She had used a spell of great power in behalf of 
Saul, who was in disguise, and unknown to her ; and 
thus had compelled the visible presence of one of the 
most devout servants of the Most High God. Even 
she was appalled, not at the sight of the " old man 
covered with a mantle," but that she saw "gods de- 
scending to the earth." 

The fate of Saul would have been the same had not 
the prophet from the dead pronounced that fearful 
doom, " To-morrow shalt thou and thy sons be as I 



68 GENIAL MINISTRY. 

am," but lie might till the last have realized that 
vague comfort to be found in the uncertainty of des- 
tiny, and in the faint incitements of hope. Fancy 
might have painted plains beyond the mountains of 
Gilboa, where the dread issues of battle were to be 
tried, and he would have been spared that period of 
agony, when the strong man was bowed to the earth 
at the certainty of doom. 

Saul and the Woman of Endor, ages on ages since, 
fulfilled their earthly mission, leaving behind this 
simple record of the power and fidelity of human 
emotions in all times and places; we cannot regret 
even the trials of Saul, in the view of enlarged hu- 
manity, for had he been other than he was, the world 
had been unblessed with this episode of woman's 
grace and woman's tenderness, in the person of the 
Woman of Endor. 



#jjaptu <Big)rtjr. 



The greatest defenders of Astrology do agree amongst themselves, that it cannot 
reach so far as to foretell a thousand peculiar circumstances, which depend 
purely upon the freedom of man. — Nostrodamus. 1555. 

• 
I maintain that the colors, and aspects, and conjunctions of the planets, are im- 
pressed on the natures or faculties of sublunary things ; and when they occur, that 
these are excited as well in forming as in moving the body over whose motion they 
preside. — Kepler. 1606. 

Astrology — A Horoscope — Nostrodamus— Predictions. 

I almost wish I had lived a few hundred years 
earlier, that I might have an unflinching faith in 
Astrology. I do not know but I have, as it is ; for 
my own horoscope has been cast, which was so very 
satisfactory upon some points, that I desire to believe 
implicitly ; and as for the evil predicted, one can 
readily perceive that the brightest light gives place 
to the deepest shadow. It is pleasant to throw the 
responsibilities of one's life upon the stars. I do not 
care if La Place does insinuate that this faith involves 
an extravagant egotism: 

"L'homme porte par les illusions des sens a se re- 
garder comme centre de l'univers se persuader facile- 
ment que les astres influent sa destinee, et qiril est 
possible de la prevoir par 1'observation de leur aspects 
au moment de sa naissance." The ivorlcl is the worse 



70 A HOEOSCOPE. 

always, where individual self-respect is at a low ebb. 
But this is an assumption on tlie part of the Astrono- 
mers by no means in accordance with, the facts of the 
case, for that a sympathy exists between every atom 
of matter, even to the very verge of space, is an estab- 
lished belief, and the premises of Astrology are based 
upon this sympathy, which is far from making all 
matter subserve the interests of individual destiny. 
We are affected by winds, and vapors, and lunarian 
tides, and it is not for us to affix the limits to such 
influence. There is, in truth, a mere enlarged phi- 
losophy in supposing that all matter repels and at- 
tracts ; that the most distant planet held in its sphere, 
by kindred stars, must feel in its pulse the slightest 
change of balance ; and if matter thus sympathizes 
with matter, that etherealized portion subject to our 
own organization must sympathize also. Yes ! I think 
I believe — and here is an inkling of my own horoscope : 

A HOROSCOPE, 

" Quorum pars magna fui." 
Oh ! loveliest of the stars of Heaven, 

Thus did ye walk the crystal dome, 
When to the earth a child was given, 

Within a love-lit, northern home ; 
Thus leading up the starry train, 

With aspect still, benign, 
Ye move in your fair orbs again 

As on that birth long syne. 

Within her curtained room apart, 

The pale young mother faintly smiled ; 

While warmly to a father's heart 

With love and prayer was pressed the child ; 



DESTINY. 71 

And, softly to the lattice led, 

In whispers grandams show 
How those presaging stars have shed 

Around the child a glow. 

Born in the glowing summer prime, 

With planets thus conjoined in space 
As if they watched the natal time, 

And came to bless the infant face ; 
Oh ! there was gladness in that bower, 

And beauty in the sky; 
And Hope and Love foretold a dower 

Of brightest destiny. 

Unconscious child ! that smiling lay 

Where love's fond eyes, and bright stars gleamed, 
How long and toilsome grew the way 

O'er which those brilliant orbs had beamed ; 
How oft the faltering step drew back 

In terror of the path, 
When giddy steep, and wilderiag track 

Seemed fraught with only wrath ! 

How olt recoiled the woman foot, 

With tears that shamed the path she trod, 
To find a canker at the root 

Of every hope, save that in God ! 
And long, oh ! long, and weary long, 

Ere she had learned to feel 
That Love, unselfish, deep, and strong, 

Repays its own wild zeal. 

Bright Hesperus ! who on the eyes 

Of Milton poured thy brightest ray ! 
Effulgent dweller of the skies, 

Take not from me thy light away — 
I look on thee, and I recall 

The dreams of by-gone years — 
O'er many a hope I lay the pall 

With its becoming tears ; 



72 KEVERENT SEARCHERS. 

Yet turn to thee with thy full beam, 

And bless thee, oh love-giviug star ! 
For life's sweet, sad, illusive dream 

Fruition, though in Heaven afar — 
" A silver lining " hath the cloud 

Through dark and stormiest night, 
And there are eyes to pierce the shroud 

And see the hidden light. 

Thou movest side by side with Jove, 

And, 't is a quaint conceit, perchance — 
Thou seem'st in humid light to move 

As tears concealed thy burning glance — 
Such Virgil saw thee, when thine eyes, 

More lovely through their glow,* 
Won from the Thunderer of the skies 

An accent soft and low. 

And Mars is there with his red beams, 

Tumultuous, earnest, unsubdued — 
And silver-footed Dian gleams 

Faint as when she on Latmos stood— 
God help the child ! such night brought forth 

When Love to Power appeals, 
And strong-willed Mars at frozen north 

Beside Diana steals. 



" Astra regunt homines, sed regit astra Pens." 

The stars govern men, but God governs the stars. 
It was in this way that those devout old astrologers 
reconciled in their own minds, and to the consciences 
of their followers, the apparently contradictory theories 
of an arbitrary destiny, and a superintending provi- ; 
dence. The dim light of science in those days served 
rather to bewilder than guide, and they in their soli- 

* "Lachryrnis oculos suffusanitentes." 



IDEAL DREAMS. 73 

tary watchings of the heavenly bodies, beheld a mys- 
terious connection between their position, and concur- 
rent human events. 

We find in the earliest ages of society a tendency to 
this faith, and the Tower of Babel, the Pyramids of 
Egypt, the Temple of the Sun, the Tumuli of the west, 
undoubtedly served alike the purposes of the infant 
science of Astronomy, and its attendant Astrology, by 
which man sought to establish, as it were, a universal 
sympathy ; to link those solitary sentinels in space with, 
the living and breathing existence about him, served 
these purposes as well as the more profound and need- 
ful one ol religion, as yet groping in obscurity, and 
seeking material mediums for worship. 

In a later age, when the Magi were supposed to 
yield the mysteries of their art at the feet of Him, 
over whose nativity the " star " that had thus far con- 
ducted them, " stood still," the science was supposed 
to be at variance with the clearer revelations of reli- 
gion, and began to be regarded with distrust, not un- 
mingled with abhorrence. Then its advocates became 
secret and solitary students ; living apart, and indulg- 
ing in the wildest speculations. It became involved 
in the study of medicine, and the astrologer, pitying 
the sufferings of humanity, indulged in vague dreams 
of an elixir vitse ; he watched the conjunction of plan- 
ets in the hope that at some auspicious aspect, he 
might by alembic combinations, produce, withili 
the crucible, that mysterious substance, the philoso- 
pher's stone ; by means of which the base metal would 
be transmuted into gold, and thus poverty and suffer- 
ing cease to exist. In this way did Paracelsus, and 
4 



74 SOLITARY STUDENTS. 

many others, far in advance of the age in which they 
lived, in real enlightenment, mingle astrology, alche- 
my and medicine. 

At that remarkable era, when the religion of Jesus, 
imperfectly comprehended at the best, and expounded 
by men apart from the sympathies of humanity ; clois- 
tered men, to whom the ignorance of the many be- 
came a thing to be desired ; and hence vague and wild 
superstitions became current, and the general super- 
stition demanded something tangible upon which to 
exercise itself, Peter the Hermit became the inter- 
preter, and led the chivalry of Europe to the shores 
of Palestine. 

Here the sturdy knight, in the intervals of battle, 
relieved the vacuity of intellect, by studying the usages 
of the more elegant Saracen ; and the doubtful learn- 
ing of the East became mixed Lip with that of the fol- 
lowers of the Cross. The subtle ecclesiastics were not 
slow to detect real or imaginary danger, and pro- 
nounced such studies a device of Satan to mislead un- 
wary believers. They pronounced them heathenish 
and subversive of the good of the soul, and the un- 
happy advocates of astrology were made the subjects 
of vigilant scrutiny and severe prosecution. Then 
the lonely barbican became the receptacle for occult 
science, and the nightly watcher of the stars here 
learned to predict that which was to come. As those 
oalm dwellers in space pursued their untiring revolu- 
tions, the destinies of empires were supposed to be 
shadowed forth ; and the particular position of certain 
planets at the nativity of an individual, indicated the 
kind of career that awaited him. ' 



XOSTEODAMUS. 75 

With, few subjects comparatively to call forth, the 
energies of human thought, it is not surprising that it 
should busy itself with those that seemed to elevate, 
and draw the soul from the circumscribed existence of 
earth. It was but the struggling of a creature in the 
dimness of its vision, seeking the point from whence 
light seemed to emanate. 

Whatever might be said as to the utility of their 
studies, or of the tendency of their belief, we must 
yield faith to the sincerity, the religious integrity 
of purpose by which they were governed. Most 
anxious were they to exculpate themselves from the 
censure of heresy and diabolic practices of any kind. 
Hence the devout Michael JNTostrodamus claims his 
gift of prophecy to have been that of an hereditary 
one in his family; and that, although he had certainly 
studied the "Arts," in which he included astrology, 
yet did he rather regard the power as his " genius," 
derived from a spiritual mind intent upon holy specu- 
lations, and, at the time of inspiration, wrapt in deep 
and tranquil musing, alone, and in the silence of mid- 
night. 

There is a beautiful quaintness, a genial simplicity 
in the manner he describes these things, that contrasts 
with the obscurity of his predictions. He warns his 
son Csesar to avoid the study of "magic," as repug- 
nant to the canons of the church and the doctrines of 
our holy religion, and then goes on to describe the 
process of these things in his own mind, and how he 
arrived at what he terms the " anointing of vaticina- 
tion." He says, "being surprised sometimes in the week 
by a prophetical humor ; and by a long calculation, 



76 - A PREDICTION VERIFIED. 

pleasing myself in my study, I have made books of 
prophecies, each one containing an hundred astro- 
nomical stanzas, which I have joined obscurely, and 
are perpetual vaticinations." And again, " Although 
I have inserted the name of prophet here, I will not 
attribute to myself so sublime a title, for prophets are, 
properly, those who see things remote from the natural 
knowledge of men ; and by the perfect light of pro- 
phecy, may see things as well Divine as Humane." 

These " Astronomical Stanzas," the result of "long 
calculation," upon "Celestial Bodies," are, it must be 
confessed, as the author says, " obscurely joined, "nev- 
ertheless, commentators have not failed to detect the 
import of the same, and triumphantly to cite the ful- 
filment of prophecy. Many of these may be quoted as 
remarkable, were it not that the wise would at once 
repeat with exultation, the grave saying of Lord Ba- 
con, that "men mark prophecies when they hit, and 
never mark when they miss ;" and yet this very wise 
Lord Bacon, gives the prophecy of Luke Garrick, in 
the following remarkable words. 

" "When I was in France, I heard from one Dr. Pena, 
that the queen mother, who was given to curious arts, 
caused the king, her husband's, nativity to be calcu- 
lated under a false name ; and the astrologer gave a 
judgment, that he should be killed in a duel ; at 
which the queen laughed, thinking her husband to be 
above challenges and duels ; but he was slain upon a 
course at tilt, the splinters of the staff of Montgomery 
going in at his beaver. 1 '' 

The editor of Nostrodamus, who published in 1672, 
gives the same prediction recorded by Lord Bacon, as 



THE FATAL SIX. 77 

also the prophecy of Nostradamus to the like effect ; 
though certainly " obscurely joined," as should be 
such things in the matter of great men. Indeed, it 
is not surprising that these supposed revealers of the 
future — that future into which all so desire to look, 
yet shrink from the contemplation — should be re- 
garded with distrust by those who trembled with credu- 
lous fear at their predictions, even while the craving 
of curiosity led them to the oracle, with a faith equal 
to that which led the Greek to the sybil, or the Ko- 
man to the augur ; at the same time that a more 
enlightened faith taught him that "of that day and 
that hour knoweth no man;" and a severe conscience 
condemned the attempt to pry thereinto, as a weak 
distrust of the goodness of Providence. It is no won- 
der they sought obscurity ; no wonder they veiled 
their oracles in language so enigmatical, that its sense 
can scarcely be detected, even after the prediction is 
confessed to be fulfilled. That they did this is con- 
clusive evidence of their own singleness of purpose, 
and firm belief in the reality of what they foretold. 

Were we curious, many points of history might be 
without doubt found strangely coincident with these 
singular predictions. The school boy will cite the 
genius of Brutus, and the girl will remember the 
"star" of Josephine; and even a cardinal might be 
pardoned, in view of the keys of St. Peter, should he 
hesitate to adopt "the sixth," so fatal to Pius, the in- 
firm old man, exiled, and bereft of Napoleon ; who, it 
is said, in his misfortunes recalled with dismay the 
old prophecy, so strangely verified in his own fate : 

" Sextus Tarquinius, Sextus Nero, sextus et iste 
Semper sub sextus, perdita Roma fuit." 



78 OBSCURELY JOINED 

Nbstrodamus is often so censured for his obscurity, 
that his predictions seem to have fallen into disrepute, 
excepting among the few, gifted with a clearer insight, 
and adhering with a lingering reverence to the faith 
of the "olden time." Such preserve his " crabbed" 
diction, with a fond delight in the earnest simplicity 
of the good old man, upon whom the mantle of " vati-* 
cination" descended from a long train of ancestors ; 
and who beheld it finally settling upon his own son, 
Caesar ; even, it would seem, when he had well nigh 
despaired of beholding the gift continued in his 
family ; for it must be in this light that we are to un- 
derstand his exordium, " Thy late coming, my son, 
hath caused me to bestow a great deal of time in 
continual and nocturnal watchings, that I might leave 
a memorial of me after my death," &c. 

But we must not linger upon these primitive de- 
tails, but cite the prophecy reserved for us to detect, 
and announce as being in progress of fulfillment. 
And here be it understood we do not announce our- 
self as the follower of any sect of the kind, but 
simply as a searcher after the truth. Here follows the 
prophecy : 

"In Germany shall divers sects arise, 
Coming very near the happy paganism ; 
The heart captivated and small receivings, 
Shall open the gate to pay the true tithes," 

Good old man, at this time thy words are by no 
means " obscurely joined;" or at least such is the 
clearness of fulfillment, that a light gleams, even to 
the lighting up of thy obscurity. 



ITALIAN PROPHECY. 79 

He intimates in the last clause of the prophecy, that 
these " clivers sects" will captivate the heart, by which 
we trust is meant the religion shall be one of affection, 
rather than of logical deduction; for, indeed, if 
people reason themselves into religion, they will also 
be liable to reason themselves out ; and we trust that 
he did mean that this is to be the state of the case, 
and that the "true tithes" mean a general sense of 
justice, a simplicity of life, by which all will be con- 
tent with " small receivings." 

ITALIAN PROPHECY. 

I subjoin a few other predictions of this renowned 
soothsayer : 

"They shall come to agreement, in which 
The true Tithes shall be paid, 
And every one come to his own again." 

This, of the true Tithes, seems to be a favorite 
idea, and shows that he foresaw a better and larger 
humanity, that future times would develop. 

"One coming too late, the execution shall be done, 
The wind being contrary, and letters intercepted by the way 
The conspirator's fourteen of a Sect, 
By the red-haired man the undertaking shall be made." 

I wish I could divine anything cheering for unhap- 
py Italy, in the following. Indeed, I think the spirit- 
ually discerned may see the significancy of that quaint 
" Sharp by Letters," that creates a power more invin- 
cible than walls. 

" Oh great Rome! thy ruin draweth near, 
Not of thy walls, thy blood, or substance, 
The Sharp by Letters shall make so home a notch : 
Sharp iron thrust in all to the haft." 



Chapter UWJr, 

Hieroglyphics old, 
Which sages and keen-eyed astrologers, 
Then living on the earth, with laboring thought 
Won from the gaze of many centuries ; 
Now lost, save what we find on remnants huge 
Of stone, or marble swart ; their import gone, 
Their wisdom long since fled. — Keats. 

Shakspeare's belief in Astrology — Madam De Stael — The Prescience of the Poet. 

Shakspeare is a northern mine of superstition. He 
is imbued, heart and soul, with, the wildest and most 
beautiful faith. The stars walk up and down hia 
pages, as if he himself had marshalled them in space, 
and they came and went at his bidding. His charac- 
ters have the occult phraseology at their finger's end. 
He never insults us by forcing upon our minds what 
he does not feel himself. The Weird Sisters concoct- 
ed " their broth under his own eyes," and " paltered in 
double sense " to him, before they warped the whole 
destiny of the noble Macbeth. His ghosts first cur- 
dled his own blood before it could ours, and he must 
have felt his own; "few men rightly temper with 
stars." 

No matter what aspect of humanity he delineates, 
his astrological allusions are always apposite, touch- 



shakspeake's faith. 81 

ing, and beautiful. The weeping Margaret exclaims, 
over the head of Suffolk : 

" Hath this lovely face 
Kuled, like a wandering planet, over me, 
And could it not enforce thee to relent ?" 

Poor Hermoine schools herself to patience by the 
reflection, 

" There's some ill planet reign3 : 
I must be patient till the heavens look 
With an aspect more favorable." 

The half frantic Lear, bewildered by the ingratitude 
of his two daughters, looks to the stars as the only Avay 
of accounting for such manifestations, and cries, 

" It is the stars, 
The stars above us govern our conditions, 
Else one self-mate and mate would not beget 
Such different issues." 

And Othello, appalled at his own misery, exclaims, 

"It is the error of the moon ; 
She comes more near the earth than she was wont, 
And makes men mad." 

So the wise and forecasting Prospero tells the beau- 
tiful and compassionating Miranda : 

" I find my zenith doth depend upon 
A most auspicious star, whose influence 
If now I court not, but omit, my fortunes 
Will ever after droop" 

" The stars, in their courses, fought against Sisera, 11 
is a well-known astrological allusion of scripture. 
4* 



82 SEER AND POET. 

One secret of the interest with which Shakspeare 
has invested Hamlet, may be found in the clearness 
of his intellect, which repelled the suggestions of a 
fatality ; his instincts shrink and recoil from the 
spectre, but its shape appears to his intellect & u ques- 
tionable" one, and he speaks to it. He has long been 
convinced of the presence of wrongs, with which his 
will is too feeble to grapple, and the doom, which is 
forced upon him even by supernatural means, he still 
tries to escape. Not so with Macbeth ; he is an un- 
compromising believer in his fate, and the desperate 
hardihood with which he closes his career, is but the 
fatal despair of one who sees, " that the juggling 
fiends, who palter in a double sense," had predicted 
such a destiny, when "Birnam Wood should come 
to Dunsinane." 

Madam de Stael has said, " there is no one who has 
not some mysterious idea of his own destiny, — one 
event which he has always-dreaded, and which, though 
improbable, is sure to happen." In this way we are 
all gifted with a certain degree of prescience, greater 
or less as we rise in the scale of human endowment. 
The idiot has but the rudiments of common faculties, 
limited to the dull and wavering promptings of in- 
stinct, — the scale enlarges up to the god-approaching 
qualities of the philosopher and the poet, to the latter 
of whom is given, in the highest earthly compass, the 
faculty of which we are speaking. Seer and poet 
were originally one and the same term. To speak the 
language of coherence, yet as by a sudden and over- 
whelming impulse, is the action of prophecy, and such 
too is the action of poetry. 



PRESCIENCE. 83 

" Come curse me Israel, and defy me Jacob," and 
the Seer lifted up his eyes and beheld the order and 
harmony of the wayfaring people, and he cried, " How 
goodly are thy tents, 0, Israel ! and thy tabernacles, 
O, Jacob. As the valleys are they spread forth, as 
gardens by the river's side, as the trees of aloes 
which the Lord hath planted, and as cedar-trees be- 
side the waters. There shall come a star out of Jacob, 
and a sceptre shall arise out of Israel, and shall smite 
the corners of Moab." 

Here is the inspiration of the prophet uttered in the 
most elevated and beautiful language of poetry. Had 
he been less than he was he might have cursed in 
obedience to the terrified monarch, and have been 
" promoted to honor," might have sat b}^ the side of 
royalty in purple robes and cumberings of gold, but 
being one of God's own oracles of truth, it sprang to 
his lips despite of consequence. The man of talents 
may mould his career in accordance with interest and 
expediency, but the man of genius is God's own child, 
endowed by Him who will take care of his own gift, 
will bring it to utterance, and to utterance that may 
sometimes appall even him who speaks. He ma}^ feel 
that he grasps his powers by a strong will, but he will 
feel likewise, that those very powers impel him, that their 
action is beyond himself, to a certain extent 

How often must the poet, in after years, recoil from 
his own utterance, when he perceives that in the 
spirit of prophecy, what had been the fretwork of 
fancy became at length the web of his own destiny ! 

Men of genius are always what the world call 
more or less superstitious. Their own prescience so 



84 THE POET THE SOOTHSAYER. 

often has anticipated events, that they are apt to 
perceive intimations, and detect coincidences unob- 
served by others ; what to the common eye seems 
impossible and strange, to them has a feasibility and 
naturalness altogether accordant with their experience. 
Jacob Behman and Swedenborg had this quality of 
foreknowledge in an eminent degree. Both predicted 
the time of their own death, which occurred as they 
had foretold. 

The world has come to the grave conclusion, that 
many things told by the poets are not truth, and are 
not to be received as such, and they call it " poetizing," 
• ■ romancing," &c. ; yet these very people will refresh 
themselves over the pages of the poet, and go forth 
with a deeper thought gathering in the soul, and for- 
get to see that this is not the ignis fatuus of falsehood, 
but the steady light of truth, which has been made to 
shine into the dim chambers of their souls, and light 
up recesses that were damp and dark for want of use. 
The poet is the great truthteller, for he speaks not to 
one or two faculties, but to all ; and to those most 
which most link us to the eternal. 

The poet is the prophet of his age. Who can read 
the noble aspirations of Milton, and not feel that he 
foresaw the great problem of human liberty, which 
from thenceforward was to be worked out ; and the 
sublime resignation with which, in poverty, and ne- 
glect and blindness, he writes the following noble 
sonnet, is enough to bring tears to the eyes, so much 
does our own humanity weigh us in view of his god- 
like magnanimity. 



OVERWHELMING FATE. 85 

" Cyriack, this three years' day these eyes, though clear, 

To outward view, of blemish or of spot, 

Bereft of light, their seeing have forgot ; 

Nor to their idle orbs doth sight appear 

Of sun or moon, or star, throughout the year ; 

Or man, or woman. Yet I argue not 

Against Heaven's hand or will, nor bate a jot 

Of heart or hope ; but still bear up and steer 

Right onward. What supports me, dost thou ask ? 

The conscience, friend, to have lost them overplied 

In Liberty's defence, my noble task, 

Of which all Europe rings from side to side. 

This thought might lead me through the world's vain mask, 

Content though blind, had I no better guide." 

What further need had the great man for human 
vision ? His external life and labor were accom- 
plished ; and the u orbs, though clear, to outward view, 
of blemish or of spot," forgot their seeing only be- 
cause their spiritual life had 'opened, in his own 
words, 

" Heaven hides nothing from their view , 
Nor the deep tract of Hell." 

Instances innumerable might be cited to show the 
prevalence of this prescience in the human character. 
We have before said it is an invariable element of the 
poetic mind, and all others have it more or less. 
Thousands feel themselves impelled as by an irresisti- 
ble hand in a certain direction, from whence they ex- 
pect more or less vaguely some good ; others are im- 
pelled in the same way, feeling and dreading an evil 
which they have no power to escape. The most un- 



86 JOSEPHINE. 

likely and splendid results of fortune have been real- 
ized in connexion with this feeling ; crimes the most 
terrible have been committed under the sense of this 
blind fatality. 

This is the great and overwhelming fate which 
held the Pagan world in thrall, and which gives such 
sublime and fearful interest to the Greek tragedy. 
The oriental world is yet in bondage to the faith as if 
the whole atmosphere hacl imbibed the spells of the 
terrible Parcse. 

It is the existence of this faculty in all minds in a 
rudimentary state, that makes the dreams of the as- 
trologer, and the predictions of the fortune teller in 
such repute among the common people, while those of 
a deeper fore knowledge often recoil from these things 
as " too mighty for them." The well known story of 
Josephine, whom an old negress foretold should one 
day become greater than a queen, is a curious confir- 
mation of this faculty strengthened by the prescience, 
real or accidental, of another. Imprisoned in the Bas- 
tile, exposed every hour to be dragged forth to the 
guillotine ; separated from her children, suffering pov- 
erty, proscription, and the loss of those dear to her, 
from the cruel persecutions of the period ; she was often 
heard to say cheerfully, when others expressed their 
fears as to her fate, "No, no, I shall not die yet, it is 
not my destiny," and this uncertain promise of future 
good she frankly confessed helped to sustain her in 
the severity of her trials. "It is my star that rules 
your destiny," was her affecting remonstrance to Na- 
poleon in view of the divorce. . 



LADY HESTER STANHOPE. 87 

For good or for ill all move onward to a point, often 
foreign to their purpose, yet hearing whether they 
will or no the warning voice, "I will meet thee at 
Philippi." The magnitude of results is in proportion 
to the depth and strength of the individual. Few 
escape poverty, exile and imprisonment to wear an 
imperial crown, and few like the Soman, find them- 
selves at Philippi, with the ruins of empire and the 
hopes of the patriot crushed at their feet. 

To the common mind happen common events, yet 
not the less those which a vague necessity would seem 
to imply. The whimsical story of the English girl 
who was wrecked upon the coast of Africa, shows how 
strong a presentiment of the kind had fixed itself upon 
her mind. When protection and a voyage home were 
offered her she refused to leave the country, remember- 
ing it had been predicted that she should wear a 
crown. Accordingly she was carried by a party of 
Arabs, across the country, and subsequently became 
queen to his majesty of Morocco. 

Lady Hester Stanhope, yielding herself to the vaga- 
ries of this blind sense of destiny, wasted her beauty 
and her talents in the desert, surrounded by ignorant 
Arabs whose great point of sympathy with the fair 
exile consisted in a faith as unswerving as her own, in 
the fixedness of fate ; had her nerves been a trifle 
stronger, and her purse deeper, it is impossible to pre- 
dict what splendor might have marked the career of 
this singular woman. 



Cjruphr €tnfy. 

The night has been unruly ; where wo lay, 
Our chimneys were blown down : and, as they say, 
Lamentings heard in the air ; strange screams of death, 
And prophesying, with accents terrible. 

The obscure bird 
Clamored the livelong night : some say, the earth 
Was feverous, and did shake. — Shakspeare, 

Astrology — The two Horoscopes — The Unfortunate grow Superstitious — Pleasant 
Fancies — Irish Superstition — Good Old Mary. 

Theee is something sublime in the departure of 
such men as Cromwell and Napoleon, amid the wild 
war of the elements — and our own Jacob Leisler also 
was led forth to the scaffold in the midst of such tumult, 
as if the spirits of earth unwillingly yielded up these 
beings so wonderfully endowed, children compounded 
out of their own realms of power, over whom they would 
have no control in the next great stage of existence. There 
are many of the predictions of Lilly still extant, show- 
ing that the men of the times of Cromwell placed much 
reliance upon planetary indications, and one, in which 
the death of Charles is plainly intimated, and which 
is supposed to have had much influence in deciding 
the fate of the unhappy monarch. All imaginative 
minds have more or less delight in the occult, and 
make no scruple in admitting it. Cromwell, and Na- 



PRINCE GEORGE, THE SWEEPER. 89 

poleon, and Goethe, and Scott, to say nothing of the 
beautiful Josephine, believed in these things. I have 
found very few entirely indifferent to the subject. It 
is a faith that seems quite harmless ; for none of us 
square our lives by the stars, although we may be 
amused at coincidences. 

I lately found, in an old astrological work, the 
horoscope of the Prince of Wales, (George the Fourth) 
together with that of a little chimney sweep, ushered 
into the world the same clay and hour that witnessed 
the birth of the slip of royalty, and was therefore 
christened by the name of Prince George. One child 
wrapped in purple, the other rolled in its sooty blanket ; 
yet the same stars, indicating a similarity of destiny, 
and the results is whimsically verified. Of the career 
of the Prince of Wales it is unnecessary to speak — his 
vices, his follies, his perjuries were all royal, and his 
fellow, the sweep, was not a jot behind him. The 
broom and scraper were found as ill adapted to the 
hands of the one, as the sceptre to the hands of the 
other. The parents of Prince George, tired of his profli- 
gacy which shamed their profession, finally established 
him as a tallow chandler. He was now a ruler with 
apprentices and coteries about him, and could follow 
the bent of his genius. He was handsome, courteous, 
gallant, a spendthrift, and a gamester, as testified be- 
fore the age of twenty, the fortune and reputation of 
the family having suffered much through his tenden- 
cies of this kind. He soon became famous in his own 
sphere, dressed in the best style of his class, was the 
idol of the women, the essence of politeness, the greatest 
better and gamester at all the races and fairs within ten 



90 MY EVIL STAES. 

miles of London, and finally kept the best asses, and 
run the best donkey-races of the day. All this time 
his royal compeer was working out his destiny per- 
fectly analogous, excepting one is "high life above, 
the other below stairs " — the one races with a blood 
horse, the other with a donkey. But all glory must 
have an end ; the Prince of Wales became bankrupt, 
and the Prince Greorge " smashed " — the very day that 
the stud of his Royal highness. Prince of Wales, was sold 
by Tattersal, the racing donkeys and ponies of Prince 
George were put to the hammer. Sic transit. 

There is something exceedingly affecting in the 
superstitions of the unfortunate in life — something 
touching in their instinctive loosening of the burden 
of ill from their own responsibility, and placing it to 
the account of the stars. My evil stars would have it 
so, they say ; my ill luck followed me. They are not 
born, like the saucy Beatrice, under a merry planet, 
and they magnify the influence of the baneful. If a 
dog howl they at once think it an omen of death — a 
broken looking glass is ill fortune — to dream of the 
loss of a tooth is the death of a friend. All this is 
imbecile, and unworthy the dignified office of pres- 
cience. 

There are some superstitions, however, too beautiful 
to be suppressed. Thus, when a tree is seen to bend 
its branches over a house, falling and encircling it, as 
it were, it is an indication of evil impending over the 
family ; but when a tree in growing bows away from 
the dwelling, and suffers the sunshine to embrace it 
warmly, it foreshows honor and prosperity to the 
household. 



OMENS. 91 

So also to dream of myrtles, indicates a lover, and 
roses, happiness : here is a touch of classic beauty, in- 
clining one to admit these into favor. 

At Berlatz, when a family has lost one of its mem- 
bers, they immediately cat off all the flowers in the 
garden, and they suffer no more of them to blow while 
the mourning lasts. This touching custom prevailed 
among the Greeks. 

The belief is universal, that when any of the family 
dies, if a badge of black be not put upon the hives, 
the bees will sicken, or else leave the place. I would Z— 
not do away this belief if I could, for it springs from 
that depth of sympathy, that counterpart to love, 
which sorrow always bears, by which, when we mourn, 
we invest all nature and life with the sentiment, the 
universal pang, answering to the darkness within. 

Amongst the Irish, whose cabins are often covered 
with the houseleek (sempervivem tectoram), it is re- 
garded as a protection from all maladies to which 
they might be subject ; and hence, to carry it off is a 
sacrilege. When in flower, they place crosses made 
of it over the doorway. So, also, the misletoe is still 
held sacred, traditionally, from the Druids, and its 
leaves, either drank or placed upon the stomach, are 
an antidote to poison. 

To kill a toad is ill luck — to kill a swallow will 
cause the cows to yield bloody milk. 

This too is a pleasing superstition, for the swallow 
is associated with quietude and sunshine, and should 
be sacred. 

"No jutty, frieze, 
Buttress, nor coigne of vantage, but this bird 
Hath made his pendent bed, and procreant cradle ; 



92 OMENS. 

Where they most breed or haunt, I have observed, 
The air is delicate." 

FRIDAY— THE SALT. 

To see the new moon oyer the left shoulder is ill 
luck — good over the right. This is not an unpleasant 
mode of vaticination. 

Friday is an unlucky day — this superstition came 
in with our religion, and as good Christians we will 
note it. All executions take place upon that day— 
hence, nobody will be married upon it. Some pre- 
tend to say more crimes, accidents, and monstrous 
births occur on that day than any other — well, I like 
to lump the evil into one great heap, and thus feel it 
worth submitting to : so Friday may as well take the 
responsibility. Sailors, do not like Friday. A mer- 
chant wishing to overcome this prejudice to the day, 
laid the hull of a ship on Friday — she was launched 
on Friday — was named the Friday — she sailed on Fri- 
day, and was wrecked on Friday. 

Never help your neighbor to salt — never put it 
upon his plate — it is said to part friends. I like all 
superstitions that recognise friendly relations. This 
must be of very ancient origin, when the salt was the 
bond of fraternity — the salt-partaking guest being 
sacred amongst the Arabs. 

Dreams, say the wiseacres, are to be interpreted by 
contraries. Thus, if you dream of filth, you will ac- 
quire something valuable ; if you dream of the dead, 
you will hear news of the living : if you dream of 
gold and silver, you run a risk of being without 
either ; and if you dream you have many friends, you 



IRISH FAITH. 93 

will be persecuted by many enemies. The rule, how- 
ever, does not hold good in all cases. It is fortunate 
to dream of little pigs, but unfortunate to dream of big 
bullocks. I dissent from this entirely. It cannot be 
good to dream of this filthy beast, in whatever state 
of incipiency he may be. A swine is a swine, even 
when a " youngling," and an "innocent." It argues 
a bad state of pulse to dream of them, just as it argues a 
depraved digestion to eat of them. If you dream that 
your house is on fire, you will receive news from a far 
country. If you dream of vermin, it. is a sign that 
there will be sickness in your family ; and if you 
dream of serpents, you wffi have friends who, in the 
course of time, will prove your bitterest ememies. 

Heaven bless the Irish ; their faith is after my own 
heart. Nothing is without significancy to them. I 
always feel entirely safe with an Irish servant — I 
know she will stand watch and warder over all the 
mystical; and that must be a " shrewd " omen that 
can escape her. I yield up the whole occult realm 
to her keeping, sure she will give me due notice when 
I may prepare to rejoice, or get ready the lachrymals. 
I feel a tender security, released from responsibility as 
it were, for the time being. Then, too, they have 
such respect for one's icliosyncracies, feel so kindly 
towards our whims, and see so into the very soul of our 
humors, that we grow quite refreshed under their 
careful deference. They learn to respect the arm 
chair, the cosey corner, localities around which habit 
and affection twine themselves, and to move them is 
a desecration. " Mary, good Mary, leave the chair in 
the same spot." u Ah ! Madam, it would look so 



94 GOOD, OLD MARY. 

much, prettier by the window, make the room look 
so much better." "Yes, Mary, but I have written 
there these three whole days." 

The good creature gave me a look of commiseration 
— she knows my infirmity — the chair remains. Luckily 
for me she is akin to me in that respect. Does she not 
stay with me in spite of my many disadvantages, only 
because she has " got used to my ways?" Does she not 
even suppress that low, musical wheeze, her nearest 
approach to external melody, lest she should worry 
my nerves ? Kind soul, she knows an extra wheeze 
of hers would give me the heartache. 

We were moving. "Have you fed the cat well? 
Mary, and made her quite comfortable till our success- 
ors come in?" "Yes, indeed, Ma'am, if they do not 
come for a week !" 

"Poor Kitty, delicate Grimalkin! I have never 
fondled thee, for truth to tell, I do not love thy species 
- — but I have noted thy dainty ways with an artist's 
admiration — thy excellent maternity has not been 
unnoted ; when thou hast chosen the nicest cushion 
for thy siesta, I have commended thy taste. Wow I 
must leave thee — thou art the Genius Loci, and the 
gods bless the new comers, as they are kind to thee." 

The reader will bear in mind it is ill luck to move 
a cat. 

Mary held a broom in her hand — a better one, I 
fear, than often falls to her lot in our household. 
" Shall I take it to the new house?" 

"Have your own way, Mary." "It is bad luck 
Ma'am, to move a broom." " Leave it, by all means, 
then." 



DISRUPTED TIES. 95 

Bless her true Irish heart, filled to the brim with 
the wild superstitions of her country. And now we 
must go, and leave all these nooks endeared by a grief, 
or saddened by some genial recollection that will live 
only in the heart's core. Go and miss the papers for 
a week, miss the penny -post ; lose poor little Biddy 
who used to come, like a bird, every morning for a 
breakfast, or a penny, and inwardly rejoice me in the 
hope of her blessing. 

No wonder the mandrake groans to be torn from 
the earth. We are all mandrakes when disrupted 
from home. 

All is confusion ! Will the Lares ever find the 
hearth-stone ? the Penates their Penetralia ? It is the 
chaos of the home world. u Place that beautiful rose 
there — that table here ; gently, good Maryj it is weak 
in the legs ; now for the arm chair, remember the 
castors are a little loose, and the covering must be 
touched gingerly. Bid Ned look to the pigeons, for 
they will have to learn to like the new home, and now 
I must write. 77 

Mary smuggled some rubbish out of sight, brought 
her one eye to bear kindly upon me, and then went 
out feeling I carried a blessing in my bosom for her. 
I tried to write — alas ! where was the ugly crack in 
the wall, where my eyes had been fixed for many a 
day. Where was the bust of Milton, the demi-god of 
my mind's eye — there, it is true, but one side of the 
nose gone. The knight holds his head between his 
hands. Cleopatra is turned to the wall — alack ! 
alack! " I cannot get the hang of it," as the boy said 
of the new school house. I am on the verge of tears ; let 



96 THE NEW HOME. 

me take tlie dent out of this tat, and I will go refresh 
myself with air, water, and sunshine ; and it will be 
hard with me if I am not as good as new in an hour's 

time. 

THE NEW HOME. 

Change, change ! From childhood it was irksome to 
me— and to this day I have a stubborn rejection of the 
new. I hate new people, new clothes, and above all, 
new homes. Everybody has a buckram look in a 
new dress — they are full of angles ; are Janus-like, 
looking behind, before and upon each side ; there is a 
doubt whether they will take kindly to the garment — 
whether the limbs will fall naturally into their new 
location, or, fretful and rampant, reject it altogether. 
So with the new home, it glares upon you with new- 
ness; it walls you in with an ill sense of limitness ; — 
for all houses give one a sense of compression, and 
one must out under the broad heavens sometimes to 
be quite sure that he is not " cabined, cribbed, con- 
fined." To feel the full grandeur of freedom and life 
he must mount a horse and away — then home, to rein 
in his spirit ; fold his wings, tame down the eye ; still 
the beating of the heart, and be like the rest of the 
world, impassible and stupid. 

I wandered uneasily from room to room wishing ha- 
bits, which are dull but comfortable things, could be 
the birth of volition. The halls had a cold, solitary 
echo — shadows of retreating spirits, belonging to the 
former occupants, "uncannie," lam sure, trailed bat- 
like wings along the walls. I saw a light under Mary's 



mary's prayers. 97 

door, all else was dark and silent. I touched the door 
gently and looked in, for sleep is a sacred thing — 

" The soul, fatigued away, 
Fled like a thought, until the morrow day, 
Blissfully havened both from joy and pain; 
Clasped like a missal where swart Paynims pray; 
Blinded alike from sunshine and from rain, 
As though a rose should shut and be a bud again." 

Poetic imagery can never go beyond the grace and 
beauty of that last line ; and though the sleeping of 
the good Mary might not remind one of a rose bud, 
yet her fifty winters of maidenhood have held in 
abeyance a blossom to be unfolded in Paradise. I was 
sure of it — yes, I knew it was so. w I felt the descent of 
cherubs of peace and hope, perching themselves on the 
foot board ; hiding in nook and peering out from be- 
hind the books; I heard them "tilling at the latch," 
where the children slept, and bouncing in and out of 
the kitchen. Could they fail to obey the invocation 
of the good soul? There she was upon her knees, 
counting her beads, one eye closed, (and the other is 
of no account) while the rest of us were sleeping, or 
wandering, myself, like an uneasy ghost. 

The Supernatural. — I crept back to my room — 
hour after hour passed — twelve, one — suddenly three 
knocks, long, solemn, and at midnight, terrible, re- 
sounded through the house. What could they be ? 
brick walls give out no such sounds, and all was silent ; 
my heart certainly beat loudly — the room had a dim 
unearthly look. 
5 



98 two o'clock. 

" There are more things in heaven and earth, 
Than are dreamed of in onr philosophy.'' 

I wonder if I should have courage to face the super- 
natural, to question it, if the conviction of its certainty 
were forced home to my mind ? Last night, when the 
clock struck twelve, the remembrance of the knocks 
sent a chill through my veins. I began to close my 
desk, and then a sense of the childishness of such fear, 
made me resume my pen, and I was soon lost in my 
subject. Now the house clock is a steady, useful arti- 
cle, not given to " cantrips," ticking on, day after day, 
and never " discontented " with the labor; striking 
with clearness and precision the hours as they fill up 
the space of sixty minutes. It had struck the hour of 
twelve — "not a creature was stirring, not even a 
mouse." Suddenly, slow, solemn, the clock struck, 
one, two — I took the light, and went out to solve the 
mystery. All was hushed — the clock was going on as 
usual — no change, the minutes, the hours were the or- 
dinary time — a quarter past twelve. Sounds of mys- 
terious import! where in space — where in this breath- 
ing world is the record two ! The beat of whose heart 
at the mystic hour of two to them, quarter past twelve 
to me, has found an echo in my solitude ! I will be- 
lieve, I long to feel that such things may be — I am 
joyful at the thought, that communications adapted 
to our strength may be afforded us ; intimations of the 
presence of the loved — the gone before, may be, are 
vouchsafed to us, not in shapes such as curdle the 
blood, but simple, yet impressive sounds, because 
" hitherto ye were not able to bear them, neither now 
are ye able," saith the divine Teacher. 



Cjrapfrr « Imirtjj. 



" The tear whose source I could not guess, 
The deep sigh that seemed fatherless, 

Were mine in early days ; 
And now, unforced by Time to part 
With Fancy, I obey my heart, 

And venture on your praise." — Wordsworth. 

Contempt cast upon the Imagination — Latent Truths unfolding — Double. 
Dreaming — Ghosts. 

"If they believe not Moses and the prophets, nei- 
ther will they be persuaded though one should rise 
from the dead." These words of the Divine Teacher 
have the vividness and authority of Truth. The mind, 
incapable of receiving the demonstrations of the un- 
derstanding, the evidence of human testimony, and 
the authority of tradition, will be far less ready to 
accept the testimony supposed to come through the 
doubtful source of the Imagination. It would be 
curious to inquire into the reason why such contempt 
is cast upon this God-like faculty, one more arbitrarily 
distributed than any other, as though it were a best 
and final gift imparted richly only to the few. Indeed, 
all that is essential for our well-being in this world 
can be carried on through the help of other faculties ; 
we can be judicious, witty, provident, energetic, and 



100 IMAGINATION. 

loving, without the aid of the Imagination ; and, there- 
fore, the majority of mankind have it only in the rudi- 
mentary state ; and these are the dull wiseacres, who 
sneer at what they have not the instruments to mea- 
sure ; laugh at what they cannot comprehend, and go 
about triumphantly flaunting their own deficiencies. 

A munificent bestowal of the Imagination, other 
things being equal, gives the man of enlarged and 
comprehensive views, the far-seer into truth, the pro- 
phetic observer, the Milton, or Shakspeare, of the age. 
It presents, as it were, wings to the soul ; imparts as- 
piration; gives a glow and elevation to all the other 
faculties of the mind — shaking them from the dust, 
and lifting them into a higher and better atmosphere. 

Now it is a curious fact, that all matters relating to 
the supernatural, are cast at once upon this faculty — 
thus giving it an omnipotence of power. A knock 
heard at an unwonted hour is at once referred to the 
Imagination — any unusual form, sight, or movement, 
is imputed to an excitement of this organ. To me, 
this seems an exceeding unphilosophic, not to say in- 
dolent disposal of the matter. Either these things did, 
or did not exist. I do not believe that a faculty that 
aided Shakspeare to comprehend the universal in the 
human mind, and the blind Milton to see all space 
peopled with beings intent upon missions from the 
Most High, Cromwell and Napoleon to detect the rot- 
tenness of empire, and Newton to grasp the impalpa- 
ble chain that binds the Universe into one, was given 
to mislead, abuse, and trick us into fantastical specta- 
cles. It is time we dared take hold of these matters 



THE SPIRITUAL COMING NEARER. 101 

manfully ; if truth be in them, accept it boldly, like 
any other truth — if not, reject it by the wholesale. 

"Do you believe, then?" it maybe asked. I be- 
lieve so far as my own experience, and the testimony 
of others justify. I will not believe myself deluded 
and bewildered by what is going on around me. I 
will not believe that senses, which have served me 
accurately hitherto, can be put upon by some little 
excitement only to play me tricks. 1 will sooner be- 
lieve there are hidden laws of what we call spiritual life, 
unknown to us as yet, but gradually unfolding, which, 
when comprehended, will cease to be supernatural. I 
will not insult the veracity of others by doubting 
what they tell me as facts, because these facts wear 
an air of mystery, when I would take their word 
upon all other subjects even where the issues of life 
were concerned. 

We know, in dreams, we seem to go forward, and 
anticipate what it may take us days or years to over- 
take. I remember at one time I was conscious of 
dreaming constantly and most cleliciously, and yet 
could remember afterwards only some trivial or an- 
noying circumstance in my dream, which was sure to 
transpire almost immediately — as though the mind, as 
it removed from the locality of the body, remembered 
only what was nearest to it. In this way, I was often 
whimsically reminded of my dream by the cook, who, 
unknown to me, served up the identical article I had 
seen in my sleep. For instance — I once said, "I saw 

bring in a lobster, I thought, last night." Now 

I am not particularly fond of lobsters, and they were 



102 PLATONISTS. 

but scarcely in the market. I had hardly finished 
speaking when he came in just as I had seen. 

At another time I dreamed of walking up a very 
long, narrow wharf, when a man jostled me, and went 
by bearing a little coffin under his arm. I noticed 
his step was long and high. The next day, being in- 
vited to join a sailing-party, I walked up the identical 
wharf, and the incident I have described occurred — 
the man w T ith the peculiar walk bearing the little cof- 
fin having jostled me precisely as in my sleep. At 
another time, I saw a man with a foreign, Jewish style 
of face, pass along, who fixed his eyes strangely upon 
mine. The next morning I saw the same individual 
as I walked with a friend through the Battery, who 
looked at me so fixedly as to attract the attention of 
my companion. 

Now it would seem, that, as the soul went forward 
it encountered these unimportant features on its way, 
and these being nearest home, were remembered, 
while the images of its more distant excursion faded 
in sleep-land. In this way, it may be, arises that 
puzzled feeling which we sometimes have in regard 
to persons, events, and scenes — as though we had seen 
them all before — were acquainted with them, had 
lived with them, experienced them at some hidden 
time, we know not how or when. Coleridge and 
"Wordsworth, with other Platonists, would call it pre- 
existence, but, may it not be owing to the experience 
of sleep ? — we had lived it all before in that myste- 
rious state when the body is wrapt in slumber, and 
the soul, ever active, journeys in space, and sees all 



CEKEMOXY UNESSENTIAL. 103 

that tlie body shall undergo, and anticipates its own 
freedom from the bondage of materialism. 

More than once have I in sleep hailed the idea, 
that shadows existed in that future state of beatitude 
which we call Heaven. I wander through a "faire 
countrie," joyful that my pilgrimage is over, and filled 
with repose at the purity and beauty of all things 
about me — when I behold a green slope with trees 
that lean lightly to the breeze. Shadows lie upon the 
side of the hill, cast from the trees, and I clap my 
hands with delight, saying, "on earth we thought 
there could be no shadows, as there was to be no sun, 
only a diffused light." Now this turn of thought 
had never occurred to me while waking, and it is cer- 
tainly one full of beauty ; for I fear the heaven preach- 
ed from the pulpit would be a most monotonous and 
tiresome place. 

At another time a clerical friend had died," whom 
I loved and respected. Unfortunately, to his way ot 
thinking, we differed upon religious points, which he 
regarded as of such momentous interest, that the sal- 
vation of my soul was periled by disbelief. Shortly 
after his death, I dreamed he entered the room where 
I was sitting, looking the same, only more cheerful — 
a brighter, happier look. I knew him to be a spirit, 
and did not extend any of those courtesies common 
upon meeting., friends, nor was I terrified. 

I waited for him to speak. He looked at me kindly 
for a moment in silence, and then said, "I have come 
to tell you one thing in regard to the world in which 
I now am. I find that many opinions which I on 
earth regarded as all important are of no consequence 



104 DR. PAYSON. 

there." This wears much the appearance of revela- 
tion. I was very young at the time, and exceedingly 
sensitive in regard to religious truth, holding the opin- 
ions of Dr. Payson — for it was he of whom I dream- 
ed — as next to the oracles of God, so that any retrac- 
tion on his part would have been the last expectation 
of my mind. He was a dogmatic and prejudiced 
man, though gentle to the young — that kind of gen- 
tleness that is so touching from an austere character. 

These were dreams, but certainly of a kind, that 
indicate not prophecy exactly, though we may call it 
such, but a mental experience anterior to our corporeal. 

It is a mistaken idea that dreams always have 
their origin from some subject connected with our 
previous thoughts. This is sometimes the case, with- 
out doubt, to those clogged by the external world, 
but to those of a more spiritualized nature, sleep is, 
as it were, a disenthralment of the soul, leaving it to 
a joyous freedom of condition. Metaphysicians meet 
the subject of dreams as a mental matter only — as an 
intellectual — we mean, which is but part of the nature 
of man, whereas the intellect, sentiments, and affec- 
tions, are all concerned therein, and if any part is 
quiescent, it is that ivhich is onost exhausted by the 
urgencies of life. I am willing to think that rest is 
essential even to the loftiest nature, that sabbath, 
which is at once peaceful and beatific; for even a spirit 
in a state of perpetual action must assume something 
of the diabolic. Repose is associated with a sense of 
power — it has dignity, divinity in it ; whereas we in- 
stinctively give unrest to evil. 



TIRED NATURE. 105 

We rarely dream of those in whom our affections 
are most interested, or of the subject which last en- 
gaged our thoughts upon going to sleep, the spirit 
bounding as it were from what had exhausted or im- 
peded it, and seeking a new subject. The reasoning 
faculties, those dry bones of the mind, devoid of feel- 
ing, and needless of rest, just as they are incapable 
of fatigue, (as all bores are,) will often pertinaciously 
continue a subject even in sleep, and having the field 
all to themselves, follow out results at once clear and 
profound ; groups of the faculties combine and revel, 
leaving the sister powers to repair by rest the over- 
action of the world. The lover rarely dreams of the 
object of his affections, because his waking thoughts 
are so occupied with her that rest is required. The 
mother is disappointed that she does not dream of an 
absent or beloved child, whereas, were her affections 
less active in regard to him she might often dream, 
but as it is, sleep mercifully comes to close up that 
avenue of thought, or insanity would be the result. 

So in the death of friends, those to whom we are 
most intimately and devotedly attached, rarely visit 
our dreams in the long paroxysm of our grief — as 
though the spiritual vision associated with them were 
already overdone, and we sleep in forgetfulness till 
time msij have softened the sense of bereavement ; 
while those whose loss affects us less painfully, seem 
to hover around us for awhile, as if they took pleasure 
in continuing our companionship, and would do so 
much longer did we not yield to the feeling that they 
are lost to us. Our enemies, those who are naturally 
and instinctively antagonistic to us, I believe, judging 
5* 



106 OUR ENEMIES. 

from my own experience, never visit us in sleep after 
their death — from whence we may infer their sphere 
is entirely removed from ours in the next state of ex- 
istence as well as in this. The reason why we are 
commanded to pray for them must be, not in the hope 
of sympathy, but lest in our hearts while we are will- 
ing their sphere should be divergent from our own, 
we unconsciously wish it may be a worse one. 

Of those who eat and drink grossly, and then un- 
blushingly tell of the disordered shapes that visit them 
in slumber, I can say nothing. If incubi come from 
overwrought nerves, and over-taxed sensibilities, it is 
an evil incident to the material and may indicate that 
it will soon be dissolved ; but if they come from the 
persisted-in enormities of the table, or any other 
abuses of life, depend upon it, they are real shapes 
with which the dwarfed, impoverished, and degraded 
spirit will hereafter hold companionship, and who 
come now to hold boon revelry before you are freed 
from the world. How a human being can eat or drink 
twice an article that has played mischief with him, 
seems so puerile as to be incredible, did we not know 
it to be a fact. Sleep should be 



tl T 



Light and airy from pure digestion bred, 
And temperate vapors bland," 

and the dreams of such are joyful and airy as the 
workings of the "dainty Ariel." Our waking expe- 
rience is certainly a hard unmistakable fact, and if 
our experience in sleep is equally coherent and far 
more congenial to our best nature, I know not why 



OCCURRING DREAMS. 107 

we should not equally regard it as a fact, and as a 
part of that true life into which, a state of existence 
more accordant will present us. At any rate, I am 
willing to do so, and to pray God that I may not owe 
this little evil world any spite, considering, that though 
waking may not have been oyer felicitous, sleeping 
has been a delight. 

Not unfrequently, we not only dream, but dream 
we are telling our dream. All are more or less sub- 
ject to visions that recur again and again, pertina- 
ciously. De Quincey speaks of these — they seem to be 
facts in sleep-land — places or events to which we re- 
cur in sleep memory, or which the spirit visits. 

I have had many of these ; the latest is that of being 
in a high marble room, with windows in deep embra- 
sures — lofty in height, and abundant in tracery. The 
furniture I did not notice, except at one side there is 
a luxurious mat, a sofa, table, books and boquets. 
There is an air of gloomy grandeur in the room — I 
am alone — but always there is an open portal into 
which the sunlight streams with a warm cheerful glow. 
Now I have seen nothing in life like this room, which 
I should recognize at once, if I ever had. All is for- 
eign to me, and in my sleep, I say often, "Oh I am 
in Italy again." I have so often seen this in my visions 
that I frequently tell in my sleep of this dream, and 
then I dream that I am dreaming it. (The reader 
must pardon this tautology inseparable to a subject 
whose vocabulary is limited). Once the operation 
became triplicate with singular clearness. I thought 
I had the dream so familiar to me, and was conscious 
it was a dream, for I said to myself, " I am dreaming 



108 DOUBLE ACTION. 

that I dream of that ancient room again," and then, 
as if struck with the singularity of the thing, I reach- 
ed still another consciousness which can hardly be 
seized in a waking state. I thought I said softly to 
myself— u Hush, I am dreaming that I dream that old 
dream over again," just as if I feared to destroy the 
state into which I had fallen. I do not know whether 
this is common in sleep or not — I give the fact in the 
hope that others may be led to throw further light 
upon the subject. I never knew but one, and that 
was a boy of fifteen, who was conscious of continued 
double action of the mind in sleep. It is certain that 
we have an indistinct impression of vastness, magnifi- 
cence, beauty, and. infinitude, when waking from slum- 
ber, that no effort of mere volition can produce. There 
is a depth and breadth in the internal consciousness 
which we hardly reach in waking, and which fills us 
with sublime emotions whether the result be tangible 
or not. 

In the nature of what are called Apparitions, I re- 
gret to say I have been less fortunate than in dreams. 
This may be owing to habits of poetic imagery, fill- 
ing the life with ideal shapes, which I know to be 
such, and can by no means construe into the u majesty 
of Denmark." 

Others in whose veracity I have the utmost reliance, 
have told me of experiences most singular, and I 
know of no reason why these should not be credited, 
and written down as a part of the testimony that shall 
go to establish a truth, or swell a denial. That slight 
communications have always existed between the Seen 
and the Unseen world, few will deny, if urged to the 



DULL BKAINS. 109 

point ; and yet all will cry out sturdily and triumph- 
antly, "I am not superstitious," as though that were 
any merit, one way or the other. Some are too dull 
to think at all upon the matter ; they are not super- 
stitious because they are nothing — others are too weak 
and credulous to think consistently upon any subject, 
far less upon these, that require a good endowment 
both of reason and imagination. Probably one cause 
why so much contempt is cast upon these things is, 
the poorness of the material. Ghosts are said to ap- 
pear not with the terrific majesty of Hamlet and Ban- 
quo, or the terrible significancy of Caesar's " I will 
meet thee at Philippi," but too often noisy and petty 
in their demonstrations, leaving a just doubt as to the 
existence of any truth as to the supernatural. Still 
many of these things have been thoroughly well au- 
thenticated, as in the case of the Wesley family, and 
some others of less note. It is objected that their 
revelations throw no light upon the eternal world — 
why do not they tell something that shall confirm our 
faith in those momentous interests? I have before 
spoken of these as the poor, weak gossips of Limbo, 
who know nothing which they might reveal. 



CJraptu tfttulftlj. 

A spirit passed before my face : the hair of my flesh stood up : It stood still, but I 
could not discern the form thereof : an image was before mine eyes, there was silence^ 
and I heard a voice. — Job. 

A Presentiment — Traditional Authority — Impalpable Shapes — The One Sin — The 
Penitent Child Spirit. 

If we give credence to anything beyond what we 
are able to account for, upon the grounds of reason 
and experience ; or, in other words, the supernatural, 
one point is established, namely, that a relation does 
exist between this life and a some future life, and 
that is all that is essential for us to know ; for were 
the secrets of the eternal world entirely revealed to 
us, we should be less interested in the subject than 
we now are, while it is involved in doubt and mys- 
tery. 

People often boast of not being superstitious. They 
may be the worse from the fact — lower in thought, 
and lower in the scale of being. Superstition is the 
blind element to the religious feeling, and however 
enlightened may be our views upon the great subjects 
of revelation, whoever stops short in a merely ra- 
tional religion, lacks its best principle, that instinctive 
faith which springs from the needs of humanity. He 



A PRESENTIMENT. Ill 

who believes warmly in these great truths, is apt to 
cast about to see what will confirm its hidden myste- 
ries. A man who reasons profoundly, and yet is un- 
able to recognize a consciousness beyond and above 
all reason, is devoid of one great and beautiful ele- 
ment, characteristic of an enlarged and elevated mind. 
I have observed that persons not pre-occupied with 
metaphysic subtleties, and of pureness and singleness 
of life, are the ones to receive intimations apparently 
denied to others. 

A PRESENTIMENT. 

The mother of the writer once, while engaged 
in prayer, was conscious of "great freedom and 
out-going of the spirit," (quoting her own words, 
which have a primitive and apposite beauty about 
them), such as she had never known before, till she 
attempted to pra}^ for a beloved son, Avho was then 
absent on a voyage at sea. When she named him, 
that he might be saved from the perils of the deep, 
her utterance failed her entirely — she attempted again 
and again, and each time found herself bewildered and 
expressionless. The next clay she was silent, and 
greatly depressed, and told a friend, confidentially, 
that she was sure her child was dead. He was clroiua- 
edihat very night, having been swept from the shrouds in 
a heavy gale. 

Now here was an intimation coming neither through 
the reason nor the imagination — one unexpected and 
painful — a fact in the experience of a mind, for she 
told the circumstance many weeks before the sad in- 
telligence of his death reached her, saying, most affect- 



112 EYES OF THE SPIRIT. 

ingly, "I cannot pray for him, and I am sure lie must 
be dead, or I should find comfort in doing so." 

I had a similar story from another mother, a cou- 
rageous, matter-of-fact woman, of equal directness of 
thought and feeling with the foregoing, but taciturn, 
and far less spiritual. She lived on the sea-shore, 
and had a son, on a long voyage. One night she was 
kept awake by a heavy storm, which beat against the 
windows — it was intensely dark, no moon nor any 
light in the room. She lay with her eyes open in 
the direction of the foot-board — at length she became 
conscious that she had been looking, for a length of 
time, at two small globes of light just above the frame of 
the bed. She arose, thinking they might proceed from 
some vessel in the harbor. But there was neither 
light nor rent — neither moon nor stars. She moved 
her hand over the place, thinking of glow-worms, or 
fire-flies — the lights did not change, nor did they touch 
the wood. For the first time she began to feel a mys- 
tery. "The lights," she continued, "were about as 
far apart as eyes would be ; were not glaring, but soft, 
and had a distant appearance, and yet seemed close to 
the foot of the bed. When I heard my child was 
drowned on that voyage, I felt as if he had looked in, 
that night, in the storm, upon his poor old mother." 
She rocked herself back and forth, with a new burst 
of grief. 

Now it seems to me quite as philosophic, and quite 
as human to adopt the simple, true-hearted woman's 
solution of the mystery, as to cast about and refer it 
to an excited imagination. And admitting it to have 
been conjured by the imagination, which, by the way, 



IMPISH. 113 

was not powerful with her, and had not been in a 
state of excitement, why may not that faculty have 
its truths, which are as real, as much facts, as any of the 
other faculties ? Admit these are more ethereal, more 
intangible than others ; do we not admit that we are 
not made up altogether of materialism? We raise 
corn and potatoes for our appetites, and roses and lilies 
for our sense of the beautiful, and one is as much a need 
as the other. Yet the gratification of the one is received 
through our ordinary and every-day necessities, while 
the other is a luxury and delight through the imagi- 
nation: one is as real as the other. 

A friend dies — we feel the bereavement of the affec- 
tions — see the dead body — our loss is a fact. Now if 
we have a faculty, by which intimations, disconnected 
with the body of our friend, may reach us, I see no 
reason why we should not take comfort thereby — I 
see no reason why we should not admit testimony to 
that effect — nor why we should heap contempt and 
abuse upon the faculty by which we become cognizant 
of that kind of truth. We may ourselves be deficient 
in it — we may have dulled, neglected and abused it, 
but why should we not give credence to those of clearer 
vision ? Did we do so in truth and simplicity, char- 
latans would not dare trifle and cajole the credulous, 
by attempting frauds of the kind, for the purposes of 
gain; impiously pretending to sell the gifts of the Holy 
Ghost 

Strange that we should need appeals in behalf of 
our spiritual existence, for if we truly believe in it, 
why should we not be ready to recognize intimations 



114 TKADITIONAL AUTHORITY. 

of a sympathy between that and the external ? All 
the best sentiments and affections of our nature plead 
for this, and if the reason or understanding reject the 
faith, it is only because that is a part of the soul which 
needs it not, which neither hopes nor fears, nor loves 
nor hates, hut only demonstrates. It is common to 
both gods and devils — the pure intellect — but it is not 
the soul. It is well to reason clearly — it is part of man 
to do so, but to only reason is impish. 

Reason should take the aliment craved by each of 
the other faculties, and judge of its appropriateness, 
but why she should starve the imagination, and call 
it ill names, it would be difficult to conceive. It is as 
much a part of a true man, ay, and the best part too, 
as reason herself. 

I confess I am willing to employ my reason to con- 
firm my imagination. I do doubt, and yet long to 
believe. I look about for testimony — I am ready to 
receive authority — instead of replying to some thrill- 
ing story with the impertinent, puerile, and conceited 
— "I am not superstitious," I desire to be so, in the 
best sense of the term, and only regret the meagreness 
of my own experience. Yet, that there is truth in these 
things, is evident from the universal faith in them. 
True, the vulgar have loaded them with childish and 
terrific images, but the subject admits the latter 
element, and the former must be imputed to the weak- 
ness of untutored thought. The Banshee of the Irish, 
the Second Sight of the Scotch, and the Wild Hunts- 
man of the German, all point to some truth, which has 
become crystallized into shape. I may not take 



IMPALPABLE SHAPES. 115 

these tilings literally, but they are voices "under the 
throne, to which I am willing to listen while the 
throne itself is enveloped in mystery. 

I have regretted the meagreness of my own experi- 
ence, and yet I once had a pretty incident of the unu- 
sual kind through a child. He was a healthful, lively 
and intelligent boy of three years old. One bright 
Sabbath-evening twilight he had been singing in my 
arms, and then sat awhile perfectly quiet ; suddenly 
he turned around and whispered in my ear, "Who is 
that leaning over the rocking chair?" 

"Who does it look like," I replied, without the 
least appearance of surprise — for the chair was empty, 
and stood quite near us. 

" He looks so pleasant," was the reply, in his imper- 
fect utterance. 

" Will you go and shake hands ?" I asked. He dis- 
engaged himself from my arms, crossed over to the 
chair, and looking confidingly upwards, grasped the 
air, and not till he had done so two or three times did 
his countenance change, and then he whispered, " / 
tantfeel him!" sighed heavily, and returned to my 
arms. 

The child more than once spoke of seeing objects 
in this way — was perfectly healthful, playful, and 
noisy as other children. I never showed either sur- 
prise or curiosity in the matter, never repeated the 
story in his presence, scarcely ever have talked about 
it in any way, so there was nothing to pique the mar- 
vellous in the child, and nothing to tempt to false- 
hood, by making him the hero of a story. The pres- 



116 THE ONE SIN. 

ence must have been real to him, not caused by dis- 
ease or excitement. I turned his attention at once to 
other subjects, without making any comment. 

At another time, he crawled from his little crib, 
and waked me, saying — " The peasant (pleasant) man 
has tome adain," pointing to the back of his cradle. 
There was no object that could possibly deceive the 
fancy of the child. 

" Well, go to sleep, my dear," I said. He laid down 
tranquilly, and presently called out, "He is done, 

dear " and soon was fast asleep again. There 

was nothing extraordinary in the habits of the child 
— he was affectionate, exceedingly truthful, and knew 
nothing of fear, never had known, and was of that 
joyous, happy temperament which many would sup- 
pose unallied to anything of the kind. 

The next story I shall tell was related to me many 
years ago, by a woman in the country — a pious, plain 
woman, who had it from one of her neighbors. I 
have since seen a similar story in an old newspaper 
of that vicinity, which must have come from the same 
source. If this taxes credulity, I am willing to do 
so. The story is so strange, wears so much the aspect 
of truth, that it is easier to take it as a fact, than to 
conceive of it as an invention. 

THE ONE SIN. 

A poor widow woman lived in one of the back 
towns of Maine. Her husband left her with a small 
patch of ground, a one-story house, (as it is there 
called), and two or three children. The widow mp~ 



PURLOINED TREASURE. 117 

ported these children by spinning flax for the wives 
of the neighboring farmers. It may well be conceiv- 
ed that her means were limited — that the utmost fru- 
gality existed in the little household, and that the tone 
of the family might have been of a saddened char- 
acter, likely to operate powerfully upon the nerves of 
a sensitive child. Accordingly, we find the youngest 
to have been one of those beautiful beings that come 
to gladden an earthly house for a while, and then de- 
part, leaving it desolate. He was remarkable for his 
ingenuousness, beautj^, and those ideal tastes which 
we are apt to think are developed only under refined 
and elegant associations. He was in fact the tenderly 
cared-for Benjamin of the family, and yet with a na- 
ture so fine that indulgence did not injure him. 

It happened at one time that the widow received a 
sum of money for her labor, one piece of which was 
a bright silver two shillings, worth twentj^-five cents. 
Small as was the amount, every penny was needful in 
the household, and was husbanded with care. Sud- 
denly, to the surprise and grief of the mother, the 
bright piece disappeared ; and from the appearance of 
the child, who was too ingenuous to deceive adroitly, 
and at the same time too young, being only about four 
years of age, she suspected him to have purloined it. 
She questioned him closely : he turned very pale, but 
denied all knowledge. 

This he reiterated with so much appearance of dis- 
tress, that the matter was allowed to drop ; but at the 
same time the little creature grew pale, silent, and in 
a few days died. The widow was horror-struck — she 



118 THE PENITENT CHILD-SPIRIT. 

feared her suspicions had wronged the child and caus- 
ed his death. In the excess of her grief, she spoke 
openly of her fault to the neighbors, and was well-nigh 
inconsolable, for all know there is nothing more tor- 
turing than remorse, and nothing which time so reso- 
lutely refuses to assuage. 

A few nights after its decease, as she lay weeping, 
the child seemed to stand in the centre of the room, 
not looking at herself, but as if troubled and irreso- 
lute ; at length it stooped down and put its little hand 
through an aperture or " knot-hole" in the rough 
boards of the floor, for the house was unfinished — the 
rafters and walls being all visible in their rough state 
— and the room but scantily furnished. When it had 
done this slowly, it turned toward herself and was 
gone. 

The next night she saw the same appearance. The 
third night she resolved to rise, and see if the child 
would speak to her. She did so ; but when she ap- 
proached the spot, nothing was visible. She pondered, 
the matter in her mind long and painfully, and, upon 
the first appearance of light, intent to learn all that 
could be learned in regard to this mysterious visita- 
tion, she lifted the board of the floor, and there, 
directly under the " knot-hole," was the lost piece of 
silver. 

The poor child, ingenuous in nature, true in soul, 
had lied with the lips, while every nerve and fibre in 
its being had pleaded and spoken truth even to death. 
The contest had been too much for it, and that ivhich 
was perishable had yielded to the strife. There is a ter- 
rible pathos in the incident, simple as it is. The 



THE PENITENT CHILD-SPIKIT. 119 

image of the beautiful but fallen child, hiding its pur- 
loined treasure in this child-like manner, and going 
in secresy and dread to gloat over it : and then, when 
death had closed the contest between its best and 
weaker nature, the spirit returning penitently to 
hover over the place of its one sin, that it might cure 
the stricken mother of the pangs of remorse. There is a 
consistency and beauty in the tale, a simpleness and 
truth in its texture, such as belongs to a fact, rather 
than an invention. It is one of those things we would 
like to believe. 



CJrupter €\fittitn. 

" Coming events cast their shadows "before." — Campbell. 
The ominous Thirteen — Home Superstitions — The Ghost Father — The Step Mother. 

Our book closes with the fatal thirteen, which is so 
terrific to those who attach a false estimate to life. I 
remember, two years ago, I was in a group of thirteen. 
I drew no attention to the fact, for we were all in 
fine health and spirits ; and all persons do not regard 
this world like myself as the en veiled eternal, there- 
fore, I merely noted the circumstance in my own 
mind. In less than ten days, the finest child of the 
whole group died. 

It is said that a party was once assembled in Lon- 
don, of which Lamb, Hunt, and other choice spirits 
of the day were members. Some one upon entering 
said, " thirteen" — and instantly retired — as did Lamb. 
Fontleroy, the forger, who it will be remembered was 
an accomplished man, said, "well, I will stay by, 
notwithstanding." Before the year was out, he was 
executed. 

I hope the reader will not let these omens curdle 
his blood ; but so ancient and well attested an omin- 
ousness attached to a number must be treated kindly. 
If I were musical I think I should find analogy in the 
notation of the art, and I beg others to see what they 



THIRTEEN. 121 

can do with it in this way, for I am sadly at fault in 
any theory to suit the occasion. I think I would be 
willing to be the victim of a thirteen, provided any 
good could come of it. Possibly the number is choice 
in the next stage of existence, which may account for 
its fatality in this world. The solar months are 
twelve, the lunar, thirteen. 

It would be amusing to trace home the superstitions 
prevalent amongst different people, and follow the 
analogies of location and belief. It is the fashion of 
our people to refer everything that is marvellous 
amongst us to a foreign origin : if a writer avails him- 
self of the treasures of his own imagination, or the 
mysterious lore gathered in childhood from the lips of 
nurses and simple country folk — he is accused of a 
German taint, of borrowing from some transatlantic 
source of which he never dreamed. The writer has lis- 
tened to tales of the wild and marvellous when a child 
in an old farm-house, more thrillingly beautiful than 
any recorded in books. 

Our country is peculiarly favorable for legends of 
the kind, especially to those whose families are allied 
to the first settlers of the soil. These have heard the 
traditional tales of " Fader-land" — of the " Old Coun- 
trie" — intermingled with those generated from the 
experience of the first settlers, who, removed from the 
turmoil of civilized life, having intercourse with it 
only after protracted and perilous intervals ; surrounded 
by wild beasts, by merciless and treacherous savages, 
and the gloom of immeasurable forests — weighed by 
solitude, isolation, and religious asperity — suffering 
6 



122 INTROVEBSIVE TENDENCY. 

privations, labor, and bereavement, unrelieved by the 
hope of better things in their own day, must have 
found all these combining to swell the power of that 
mystical element of the human mind, which I will not 
believe to have been idly given, or given only to de- 
ceive and degrade. Men thus situated must have 
acquired a preponderating introversive tendency; in 
their distress and gloom they would naturally be led 
to observe presentiments and dreams, and in their be- 
reavements they would seem to be bjought very near 
to the unseen ivorld. Hence we find these old families 
abound with legends, at once wild, beautiful, and 
touchingly significant. 

It is called superstition. Let that be the name. If 
we cannot restore the hardy faith of our ancestors — a 
faith evolved and strengthened by great and stirring 
times— if the need of their stoical virtues is lost in a 
more luxurious period — let us at least reverence the 
firmness with which they met the perils they encoun- 
tered, and that purity, not to say greatness of life, by 
which they stepped nearer to the spiritual in their trials, 
instead of doing as we rather do, shrink from the 
hidden and spiritual, and step, nay, plunge into the 
sensuous. The superstitions engendered by the early 
settlers have a magnitude and solidness about them 
that refreshes the mind willing to grasp them. We 
feel their origin to have been in dark and trying times. 
I remember many of these ; one shall suffice as throw- 
ing light upon the period. 

It was when the country was thinly inhabited, the 
dwellings isolated and built of logs, that a poor young 
woman, who had been but lately left a widow, gave 



THE YOUNG WIDOW. 123 

birth to a fine robust child. No one was in the house 
at the time but a girl, who in those primitive days 
filled the office of friend and servant, and who was 
dispatched at midnight, a distance of three miles, to 
procure assistance, leaving the newly made mother 
entirely alone. The women of that day had so many 
actual perils to encounter, that they were not likely to 
suffer from the pettiness and nervousness of their 
more feeble descendants, and Mrs. L. seems to have 
little regarded the circumstance of being left alone 
at such an hour, and so far removed from human 
succor. 

The girl made all haste, called up the " Groodwives" 
of the day, and hurried back, leaving them to follow. 
As she emerged from the forest, and was crossing the 
"clearing" where the house stood, she encountered a 
stranger bearing an infant in his arms. They passed 
each other rapidly, the young woman being so full 
of solicitude for her friend, that she gave the unusual 
circumstance of passing a stranger at any time, where 
the inhabitants of a whole district were all known to 
each other, and a stranger at so unusual an hour like- 
wise, but little thought. 

Upon entering the cabin, Mrs. L. was found in a 
swooning state ; she had fallen in such a manner as 
to over -lay the child, which was quite dead. The first 
words she uttered on coming to herself were, " I have 
seen my husband ; he came in and looked at the baby : 
I sprang to speak to him, but he was gone." Then 
the girl remembered the apparition she had seen. 

Here was an operation upon the minds of two. In 
the case of the bereaved wife, we may suppose her 



124 THE GOLD BECOME DIM. 

thoughts would naturally and vividly revert to the 
father of her child at such a time, and we may admit 
that her imagination would be not unlikely to pro- 
duce the semblance of her late companion ; but in the 
case of the girl this concession would have no weight, 
as she was not occupied with that current of thought 
in the least. The story presents a striking picture 
of the sufferings and isolation of the earlier settlers of 
the country. 

I remember when a child, a servant girl at my 
mother's used to wear a string of large gold beads, 
an ornament still to be found about the necks of 
women in the back towns of Maine. These beads 
were often the subject of comment with us children, 
from their peculiar hue, being leaden rather than 
golden. I strenuously insisted they had never been 
gold— only a wash. I was checked in this assertion 
in a mysterious manner upon several occasions, and 
at the same time assured that the jewelers had tested 
them, and pronounced them gold, notwithstanding 
their singular color. 

At length the girl took me one side and told the 
secret of the beads. Her mother had died many 
years before, when Sarah was quite a child, who by 
ths way was a dull, plain girl, taciturn, and grave, 
and totally unimaginative ; a kind of character which 
I, at that time, could not in the least comprehend. 
Ignorant, as children are, of constitutional differences 
of character, I supposed the stolid dullness of Sarah 
must be occasioned by what to Mrs. Chick's mind 
caused the death of poor Mrs. Dombey, "she did not 
make an effort," 



THE NEGLECTED CHILD. 125 

Just previous to the death of the good woman she 
took these beads from her own and tied them around 
the neck of Sarah, saying at the same time in the 
most emphatic manner, "I hope these beads will turn 
white, if a mother-in-law ever lays the weight of her 
finger upon them, to take them away from my child." 

At length the poor woman died, leaving her hus- 
band to another wife, as she had anticipated. The 
new mother was a stirring and harsh-tempered woman, 
not a little of a vixen, as the first wife might have 
been, judging from the speech we have recorded, and 
from demonstrations made when "out of the body," 
as we shall show, anon. 

Great changes were made in the household — the 
children were removed to less commodious rooms than 
those they had occupied in the life-time of their 
mother. The youngest, a child of two years, was put 
away to sleep by itself, in an upper and dark, cold 
room, where it often cried long and bitterly. The 
older children were frowned into silence, and the fa- 
ther, who seems to have been rather imbecile, never 
had courage to interfere. All the best articles that 
had once been the property of the late wife, and should 
have been sacred to her children, were appropriated 
by the coarse-minded woman to her own use, and 
finally the beads were taken from Sarah's neck, and 
made to grace the throat of the imperious step-mother. 
" And then their hue was changed, as I could see with 
my own eyes," continued the girl. 

These details were given me with a flood of tears ; . 
but the most remarkable was yet to come. The neigh- 
bors began to remonstrate, especially in regard to the 



126 THE ANGEL MOTHEE. 

baby, who was known to suffer from cold and neglect 
of various kinds, but this interference was to little 
purpose, as the haughty woman was much feared. 

Now the house was an old fashioned building, with 
a heavy staircase through the centre of a hall, into 
which the principal apartments opened upon each side. 
One night the child cried loudly from cold and terror, 
when the step-mother hurried from the room to still 
it, followed by Sarah. In traversing the hall, as she 
w r as about to put her foot upon the first stair, she 
stopped suddenly, uttered a loud scream, and pressed 
her hand to her cheek. She presently recovered her- 
self, and said bitterly to Sarah, " your mother has just 
struck me in the face." From that time a red spot existed 
upon that side, which no one had before seen. The child 
did not cry anymore, but when questioned said, "my 
dead ma'ma came and tucked me up and sang to me." 

It repeated the same story often, and when put to 
bed would say, "Now my dead ma'ma will come." 
In the mean while a new child was added to the fami- 
ly, and now the turbulent selfishness of the step-mother 
rendered their home so uncomfortable that the first 
children were a put out" amongst their relatives and 
friends, to live as best they might. Sarah, at the time 
she served in our family, was probably something 
over thirty, a poor disheartened being, who told what 
I have related as a part of the painful experience of 
her childhood, which she revived with reluctance. 

I have made use of the story elsewhere, with some 
changes for the sake of poetic beauty, and the critics 
have said I borrowed it from the German. Legends 
of the sort are innumerable, all having their origin in 



LANGUAGE IS TRUE. 127 

that instinctive repugnance to second marriages, so 
rife amongst our people ; a repugnance to be accounted 
for on the grounds of sentiment alone — for facts and 
philosophy are both opposed to it. A bride, it is said, 
was about to lay her head upon her pillow, when she 
saw the faint outline of one there before her. She 
moved back — nothing was visible — upon approaching 
the bed again, the same appearance chilled her with 
terror, for she saw distinctly the features of her prede- 
cessor, who waved her away. 

We can imagine that in a primitive and straitened 
society, a sentiment opposed to second marriages, 
amounting even to superstition, might exist — in Cali- 
fornia, for instance, where the gentler sex are "like 
angel visits," a community would hardly tolerate a 
monopoly of more than one ; and the feeling to which 
we have referred may have arisen in part from this 
cause, but more through a sense of inflicted injury, 
somewhere ; the husband has been cruel, the wife ill- 
used, and a spiritual visitation ensues. " Could not 
rest in my grave under such a torong" is a common ex- 
pression, and may be true, for aught we know. 



The writer has thus thrown herself into the midst 
of Dreams and Phantoms, impalpable shapes and airy 
nothings. Her material might be greatly extended, 
but perhaps her devotion to Truth will be sufficiently 
shown by what is written, and in her willingness to 
ally herself with a subject from which almost all 
shrink, as one stigmatized with contempt, and met 



128 THE TRUE LIFE IS OF THE SPIRIT. 

with, scorn and ridicule. It is certainly popular, for, 
from the most cultivated to the most illiterate, a 
" ghost story," at once arrests the attention, and com- ■ 
mands interest, if it does not respect. 

It will be seen that the writer avows some faith ; all 
that she can she is willing to award the subject — to 
her the Unseen world seems far more the true world 
— the real world — than the Seen ; for, take our life at 
its lowest estimate, the needs that belong to the spir- 
itual part of us, the thoughts and emotions that make 
up our being, are far more urgent, more real and un- 
escapable, than anything that belongs to us as mate- 
rial existences. Joy and sorrow each make us forget 
the claims of hunger ; heat and cold are forgotten in 
the intensity of thought or emotion — physical pain is 
a reliefs a comfort, in mental agony — u what shall we 
eat, and what shall we drink," absorbs comparatively 
little of our attention, while the needs of a being ca- 
pable of thought, of aspiration, of progress, all mental 
in their significance, are infinite. 

This being the case, I long to see what gleams of 
light are let into the material dwelling; gleams from' 
spiritual essences, coming from other, and more ethe- 
realized states of being, to assure and recognize the 
Tenant within ourselves. While the material, which 
passes away, has been so abundantly cared for, I desire 
to see how much light and solace is vouchsafed to that 
other more urgent and spiritual life. I am unwilling 
to reject the poorest atom of truth — but am ready to 
ask for more. It is time that men learned to meet 
these things fairly — giving them the weight to which 
they are entitled, separating the wheat from the chaff. 



J 

TWILIGHT. 129 

That much of crude imager}', of terror, and coarse if 
not foolish error, is mixed with the truth, all will ad- 
mit ; and it must be so till some clear, pure mind is 
willing to reduce the subject to shape, and give it the 
benefit of the light; for now it lurks in stealthy 
places, amid darkness and dread, paleness and the 
whisperings of guilt. Surely if there is a side thus 
dark and distorted, conjured by a guilty conscience, 
there must exist its counterpart of light, and beauty, 
and love ; if Demons, slinking and grim, may cross the 
path, Angels, likewise, fair and fearless, may walk the 
earth. Why not look into these things openly and 
bravely ? why leave them to the glowing imagina- 
tions, as they are called, of the few, and the fears of 
the many, when it may be \key have an every- day 
significance and bearing upon the experience of us 
all, only we will not come to the light to learn the 
revelation. 



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